TASK DEFINITION: Given a paragraph, generate a claim that is supported by the given paragraph. 1) The claim must contain information from within the paragraph. 2) A sentence within the paragraph can be used as a claim. 3) The claim should not have contradictions within the paragraph. 4) The claim should be at most one sentence long.
PROBLEM: This release doesn’t discuss costs in its comparison of influenza shots versus nasal sprays, although both modes of immunization have been around for a long while and the costs for both are easily known. While flu immunizations are often free through public health clinics and such, some people receive their immunizations from their family physicians and carry a specific cost. Knowing the difference in costs between the two types is useful information both for people and public health officials. The release reports similar rates of vaccine uptake for intranasal vaccine and standard flu shots. But it does not quantify benefits for the main outcome of the study, that is, rates of influenza in communities vaccinated with nasal vs injected vaccine over the course of the study. These rates were statistically no different: 5.2% for the standard vs 5.3% for the nasal vaccine. This release makes no mention of possible harms that my follow the use of either the influenza vaccine injections or nasal spray, even though there are well-known restrictions on whom should and should not receive the nasal spray, and potential negative reactions to the injections among some people. The release points out that the study was the “first blinded randomized controlled trial” done in children within largely closed communities and it found similar efficacy in using the two modes of immunization. However, we do wish the release had addressed limitations, as well as some of the complexity of making these results generalizable to a larger population, as we saw with NPR’s take on the news. While media attention is routinely heightened leading up to and during flu season, this release does not appear to reach the level of disease mongering. The release does identify the chief funder of the study, the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, although it offers no information on possible conflicts of interest among any of the researchers. The abstract of the study does state that two of the researchers do have links to pharmaceutical firms, but not in relation this study. Since the study looked a two forms of influenza vaccine administration, it obviously addresses the question of comparing alternatives. Both forms of immunization — shots and nasal spray — have been around for some time, their availability is widely known, earning the release a Satisfactory in this category. The release makes clear that the novelty of this study is its ability to examine both indirect effects of vaccination on the community as well as direct effects for persons receiving the vaccine. The release does not use any unjustifiable language.

SOLUTION: Flu nasal spray provides similar protection against influenza as flu shot: Study

PROBLEM: Scientists dubbed the startling findings “immune amnesia.” The body can rebuild those defenses — but it could take years. And with measles on the rise, “it should be a scary phenomenon,” said Dr. Michael Mina of Harvard’s school of public health, lead author of research published Thursday in the journal Science. “This goes under the radar” because doctors wouldn’t necessarily connect a child’s pneumonia to measles they suffered a year earlier, Mina explained. “But would they have gotten it if they hadn’t gotten measles?” The Harvard team analyzed blood samples taken from 77 children before and after a measles outbreak in an unvaccinated community in the Netherlands. They looked for antibodies, which remember viruses and bacteria they encounter to guard against a repeat infection. After recovering from measles, the youngsters were left with plenty of antibodies against that virus — but ones they’d previously harbored against other germs had plummeted. In the most severe cases, “they’re just as vulnerable as if they were infants,” said study senior author Stephen Elledge, a Harvard geneticist. Elledge is paid by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which also supports AP’s Health & Science Department. A separate study, published Thursday in Science Immunology, supported the findings. Researchers from Britain’s Wellcome Sanger Institute used the Dutch blood samples to genetically test antibody-producing cells, and concluded measles is eliminating enough to re-set the immune system to a baby-like state. If protection against the misery — and sometimes life-threatening effects — of measles isn’t enough reason to vaccinate children, specialists said the two studies offer a powerful new rationale. “There really are profound gaps and holes” in someone’s immunity after measles, said Dr. Anthony Fauci of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, which helped fund the Harvard work. “You ultimately recover but after a year or two or sometimes more.” “It’s doubly important to vaccinate children,” agreed Dr. Mark Mulligan of NYU Langone Health, who wasn’t involved with the new research. “It’s a vaccine that protects against the specific target, measles virus, but also against immune suppression.” Measles is one of the world’s most contagious viruses, able to spread through coughs and sneezes for four days before someone develops the characteristic rash. It sometimes leaves children with brain damage or hearing loss, and while deaths are rare in the U.S., measles killed 110,000 people globally in 2017. The vaccine offers powerful protection but a lack of access means measles remains rampant in many lower-income countries. Even the U.S., where most children are immunized, has seen a resurgence fueled by outbreaks in unvaccinated communities that in turn threaten people too young or sick to be immunized. So far this year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has counted more than 1,200 U.S. measles cases, the most since 1992. Doctors have long known that people temporarily experience weakened immunity after measles. Using decades of health records, Mina previously reported that child deaths from other infections jumped after a measles outbreak, increases that lasted two or three years. But no one knew why, until the new study. The Dutch children started out pretty healthy: Technology developed in Elledge’s lab found antibodies in their blood against typical childhood germs. But two months after recovering from measles, the children had lost on average 20 percent of their usual antibody mix. Some lost up to 70 percent of protection against specific bugs, limiting their ability to respond if they encounter that germ again. Importantly, researchers didn’t find loss of antibodies in “control” populations that didn’t get infected with measles — or in children after they received the measles vaccine. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

SOLUTION: Measles saps kids’ ability to fight other germs.

PROBLEM: The American Academy of Pediatrics, in calling on the legal right for same-sex couples to marry, said children’s well-being is affected far more by other factors such as their parents’ health and economic security than their sexual orientation. “It is better that children have two parents than one parent, and assuming that these parents love each other and love the child and have economic and social security and stability, then that’s the critical ingredient for the optimal growth and development of the child,” said Dr. Benjamin Siegel, head of an AAP committee that studied the issue. Siegel said the academy’s board of directors voted unanimously for the organization, which represents 60,000 pediatricians, to support same-sex marriage as well as the right for gay parents to adopt or foster children. “We need to have laws and regulations that support families to nurture children,” said Siegel, a pediatrician at Boston Medical Center and the Boston University School of Medicine. The U.S. Supreme Court is preparing to take up two major gay rights cases next week, one on federal benefits for same-sex married couples and another on California’s law defining marriage as between a man and a woman. Recent Reuters/Ipsos polls have found a majority of Americans support same-sex marriage and access to federal benefits such as such as tax exemptions for a surviving spouse’s inheritance. Close to 2 million American children already are being raised by gay and lesbian parents, according to the pediatric group. The group previously backed allowing a biological parent’s partner to adopt a child and allowing same-sex spouses to receive federal benefits. But its new statement, published in the journal Pediatrics, is based on more recent data showings kids do just as well when they are raised by parents of the same or different genders. “Scientific evidence affirms that children have similar developmental and emotional needs and receive similar parenting whether they are raised by parents of the same or different genders,” AAP said, citing research over the last 30 years. One 2010 study in the journal Pediatrics found teenagers with lesbian moms performed better in school and had fewer social problems, for example, when compared to teens with a mother and father (reut.rs/i7bS6w). Some gay rights opponents have questioned the long-term effects of gay marriage on children. “There cannot yet be decisive evidence,” George Will, a conservative columnist, wrote in The Washington Post last week about whether same-sex marriage was harmful. Nine states and Washington, D.C., have legalized same-sex marriage. Public and political support for marriage equality has grown in recent years and on Monday, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton became the latest politician to come out in favor of same-sex marriage. The pediatrician’s group said marriage, not civil unions, is key because it offers families stronger economic security and helps avoid issues of discrimination, intolerance and inequality that can affect parents’ self-esteem. Various state laws on adoption by gay and lesbian parents are also “an inconsistent patchwork,” it added. In Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage has been legal since 2004, Siegel sees broad acceptance of kids with gay or lesbian parents. “My experience is that parents are happier (and) the kids are fine,” he said.

SOLUTION:
U.S. pediatricians back gay marriage, adoption rights.