How Do You Feel About The Flu Shot?

My friend was also "forced" to get the flu shot. But because we live in country where ALL vaccinations are recommended, not mandatory, it was more coercion. They were told that if they didn't get the shot and became sick with the flu, they would not be paid. All employees got the shot.

My family does not get the flu vaccine.

The shot only protects against some flu strains and the virus adapts and changes quickly, so you are only protected from certain, known and common strains. It does contain weakened flu virus. I went to a seminar recently on vaccination and even the public health nurse had some reservations.

Seriously.. Get off your damn soap box.

It is about the individual person and their rights.. and if they don't want one, then you need to respect that. End of story. Just like they are respecting your right to call them selfish and tell them they are killing people.

^^^^

here in the uk you only get it on the nhs if you have a chronic condition that could compromise your immune system. Then you're not forced to. I know nothing about the US system, so wouldn't want to make a blanket comment. However I have it every year, due to a chronic condition I have & suffer nothing more than an aching arm for a few hours. My opinion is is you need it get it, if not don't - up to the individual.

Exactly.

I had one once and I am lucky to have lived thru it. I usually get the flu every year or a cold that turns into a nightmare broncitis every year, and I had taken my elderly mother into the dr. He was trying to get her to take one, she refused to, as it had made her so sick before.
So I decided I would, and that might of seriously been the worst mistake I have ever made. I was violently ill for weeks. Fever, vomiting, coughing, chills, miserable, miserable. I don't know if it were a bad dose or bad reaction but I wont be doing that again ever.

Your family has got to be the most unlucky family on the planet, to catch influenza so frequently.

And as a side not, we do not vaccinate health care workers so that they don't catch influenza while at work. We vaccinate them so that they don't make their patients sick with the virus. The vaccine prevents you from being a carrier.

That was condescending. It is unlucky but my family certainly can't be the unluckiest on the planet. Vaccinate the patients because it should still be my choice.

Many of the patients cannot recieve the vaccine because they have absolutely no immune system. Examples are SCIDS, chemotherapy (especially for bone marrow transplants), HIV seroconverted (some not all). These patients cannot have the shot because they cannot, physically, mount any form of an immune response, becasue they don't have an immune system. We are their immune system. We create a bubble around them and protect them by keeping viruses and bacteria away from them.

If you work in a hospital, you can potentially bring the the virus into the building if you don't have the shot. Once it is in the building it is so easy to transfer that virus around. You have the flu, but don't know it yet (it can take up to 48 hrs for the symtoms to appear). But you are infectious (you can spread it). You scratch your eye. You go to the elevator and press your floor. 20 minutes later a nurse working with a SCIDS patient has to go to your floor and presses the same button as you did (the flu virus can live for upto 1 hr on a dry, room temperature solid surfuce). She now has the virus particles on her hand. She rubs her nose. The flu now has a hold on her and she doesn't even know it. She goes to work with her patient 24 hours later and voila, the SCIDs kid is now exposed. Not because the RN working with them did not follow isolation protocols, but because you decided that vaccinating yourself was not important enough.

Health care workers, although in most places are not required to get the shot by law, should, for professional ethical reasons. The patients in the facilities in which we work trust us to provide them with the absolute best care we can.

Better safe than sorry for me! I don't see how a 25 dollar, 5 minute inconvenience isn't worth it. I started getting the flu shot 2 years ago, and sure enough those have been the only 2 winters that I did not get the flu. Works for me.

it isnt worth it for me because ive never gotten the flu anyway.

That's more luck than anything else.

Maybe sometimes, but not always. I've never had the flu and only four or five colds in 38 years and I'm constantly around people who have the flu and colds. Some people have great immune systems. Oh wait. Maybe that's where the luck part comes in... being born with a great immune system.

Oh wait. Maybe that's where the luck part comes in... being born with a great immune system.

Actually, newborn babies are at high risk for infections because they haven't developed an immune system until the days and weeks after birth. That's why breastfeeding if the mother is able, even for a short time, is so highly recommended because antibodies are transferred to the infant from the mother. So no, nobody was "born with a great immune system" and people who are around newborns should be very careful (including vaccinating themselves if they are able).

You may have DEVELOPED a great immune system as a child. There's some evidence to support the idea that today's toddler-aged kids' environments are too clean (antibacterial soaps, overprotective moms, less unstructured play time in the dirt) and that they aren't being exposed to enough germs to build a strong immune system.

I have gotten the flu shot off and on for several years and every year I get the flu shot I get horribly sick. For the past 2 years I haven't got one and I have not been sick. I work in a Doctors office, I am aware about that they will not make you sick. But for some reason I get sick. Just see how your body responds to it, and go from there.

The only flu shot I've ever had was the swine flu shot in 1976. I don't have trouble with getting the flu. I try to eat healthy and take care of myself. My son has been in a coma for 11 1/2 years and I won't let the nursing home give him one either, or a pnemonia shot. He got sick the first couple of years he was there when the flu and pnemonia ran rampet through the home. But after all these years of nothing, if he does catch anything, he's fought it off in 24-48 hours on his own. His immune system is like iron now and he doesn't do anything but lay in bed all day. The only movement he does on his own is to stretch.

My oldest DD and her 3 boys all get the shots every year, but they have trouble with bad asthma, and they get sick every year.

Oh wait. Maybe that's where the luck part comes in... being born with a great immune system.

Actually, newborn babies are at high risk for infections because they haven't developed an immune system until the days and weeks after birth. That's why breastfeeding if the mother is able, even for a short time, is so highly recommended because antibodies are transferred to the infant from the mother. So no, nobody was "born with a great immune system" and people who are around newborns should be very careful (including vaccinating themselves if they are able).

You may have DEVELOPED a great immune system as a child. There's some evidence to support the idea that today's toddler-aged kids' environments are too clean (antibacterial soaps, overprotective moms, less unstructured play time in the dirt) and that they aren't being exposed to enough germs to build a strong immune system.

I realize it's partly passed from mother and partly developed (I believe that theory is justified). I was over-generalizing. My mistake.

But, I don't have children, don't plan on having children, am not a nurse or teacher or in contact with "at risk" people to pass germs on to. I chose not to get the shot.