Whether to have a flu vaccination

Will you be getting the flu jab this year?

  • Yes

    Votes: 20 29.0%

  • No

    Votes: 43 62.3%

  • Undecided

    Votes: 6 8.7%
  • Total voters
    69
TiredSam said:
I used to have the flu jab every year. Last time I had it, I got the flu that winter, so now I don't bother.
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Given that there are several new flu strains every year and the vaccine only includes a selection of these, you were probably unlucky to catch a strain that wasn't included in the jab you had. There is always that risk. But I still think for those of us who don't react badly to the jab, it's worth at least reducing our chances of getting flu. We can never prevent it altogether.
 
My OH got a really bad flu too despite having the jab. We call it Mutant Flu :android: in family folklore partly because it had mutated from the jab versions and it also communicates how nasty it was. Flu seems to change quickly.

It’s a complicated dilemma that comes round each year.

The immunologist who diagnosed me told me to avoid inoculations. He said he’d seen people with similar problems triggered by having a Hep B jab, so thought it was likely to aggravate things for me. From memory the conversation came up to do with a Hep B vaccination I was meant to have, but the advice was general for all jabs. I don’t know how much this was specific to me, or general ME/PVFS advice, and it might be out of date too.

It seems like an educated risk. Though if we’re housebound, it seems to me like the best way to minimise risk is to get the people around us to have the flu jab on our behalf. I don’t know if well genetic relatives should be careful too though?

My general assessment of inoculations is they’re an amazing advance for society as a whole, but carry some element of risk for the individual. In other words I do think it’s important for children to get the normal vaccinations.

Curiously a close relative of mine (who went on to get ME) got her childhood vaccinations and still got whooping cough and mumps (and at the same time :cold_sweat:). Does this seem unusual @Jonathan Edwards ?
 
I think whooping coughs and mumps at the same tie probably overwhelmed the immune system. Like everything else in biology immunity is not a straightforward thing.

My son took chicken pox when he was about 8 month sold when his brother, sister and cousins had it. He was quite ill, but when he was 2 he took it again, though much milder this time.

I have mentioned before that there was a measles epidemic in our area when my daughter was about 3. She was very sick despite being vaccinated but there was a clear pattern that children like her became ill, but the ones who hadn't been vaccinated were hospitalised (they were treating patients in the corridor as the wards were full.
 
Jenny TipsforME said:
My general assessment of inoculations is they’re an amazing advance for society as a whole, but carry some element of risk for the individual. In other words I do think it’s important for children to get the normal vaccinations.
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From what I've learned vaccines are relatively safe. As with many medical interventions, there's a risk for small number of people suffering specific conditions, and it's unfortunate when such people haven't been adequately diagnosed and have been vaccinated nevertheless, and it has harmed them. So some people question if there should be mandatory vaccinations at all. Science says if children are not vaccinated there will be many more deaths, and I believe this. It's an interesting moral dilemma.
 
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Now I am 66 I could have the flu vaccine but so far have dithered over it and not had it done. I don't remember ever having the flu to be honest, though I think I might have had it as a young child. I have had whooping cough as an adult 9 years ago which gave me a bad ME relapse and I know that having flu is risky but have also read of the problems people have had after the vaccine which have put me off. I am still dithering.....

That said, last year my husband of 72 also refused the vaccine as he has each winter, and he had the flu badly. I didn't catch it from him though I remember feeling unwell as if my immune system was struggling with something. He is still refusing to have it this winter!
 
I insisted on getting the shot, this is actually a good reminder. I think any downside from the shot is 100 times less than the actual flu. So far that has worked out. I’m in a dense urban environment, so anything that’s going around is eventually going to land on me.

I’ve noticed people say that x got the shot and then got the flu. It takes a couple weeks for immunity from the shot to happen, so if you got the shot in week one & got the flu on week two, don’t blame the vaccine. It doesn’t work until your response kicks in. Lotta bad info echoing around the web
 
Webdog said:
Have to weigh the possible benefits of a flu shot against the likely crash from the overexertion of traveling to get a flu shot.

Things healthy people don't have to consider.
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Yes, and different people are going to have different amounts of crash. If you’re out in the woods and don’t leave the house and don’t have kids and are not across the street from the elementary school, then you’re probably not going to get the flu anyways. I’m going to get it ASAP, but that’s not the right choice for everyone here.
 
Sisyphus said:
I insisted on getting the shot, this is actually a good reminder. I think any downside from the shot is 100 times less than the actual flu. So far that has worked out. I’m in a dense urban environment, so anything that’s going around is eventually going to land on me.

I’ve noticed people say that x got the shot and then got the flu. It takes a couple weeks for immunity from the shot to happen, so if you got the shot in week one & got the flu on week two, don’t blame the vaccine. It doesn’t work until your response kicks in. Lotta bad info echoing around the web
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Yes and another problem is that people wrongly believe that symptoms indicate whether or not a person is still contagious (ex: no fever means your not contagious).

The flu is contagious for up to 9 days no matter how the ill person feels! A cold is contagious for up to 7 days! So many people don't know these simple facts.

Now that I am officially "immune suppressed" due to the medications (prednisone, plaquenil & leflunomide) I am taking for my autoimmune disease I make a point to make sure those around me know this.
 
Last year's flu vaccine only protected 15% of the 15 million people that had it from the virus, reports the Daily Mail. The difficulty is the flu virus represents a rapidly mutating moving target. But experts still recommend it as an overall effective and cost-effective public health measure.

Despite the severity of the flu outbreak last year, I think I've made up my mind I won't be getting the flu jab, as I had several vaccinations in the 2 years before falling ill, including a flu jab 2 or 3 weeks before a viral infection triggered ME. I'd rather risk natural causes than the greater anguish of something self-imposed negatively impacting my health.
 
Several decades ago an unbelievably nasty flu left me with impaired energy production. I didn't know what would happen if I ever got that sick again, so I have been getting a flu shot ever since.

My reaction is always the same. About 24 hours after the shot I get a moderate flu-like reaction. It lasts 24 - 36 hours.

When I was working I got the shot Friday evening after work. The reaction set in Saturday evening. Sunday evening I was feeling much better and I was fine when I got up for work on Monday.

I did stay in bed at least from Saturday evening. Sometimes I just spent the whole week-end in bed.
 
The flu like reaction you got was your immune system kicking in - exactly what the vaccine is meant to do. What we think of as flu like symptoms are the effects of the interferons your body produces, same with the runny nose of a cold. The way some of us feel we never get infections, I wonder if it is just that our immune systems don't work so we don't get these effects. rather than the immune system being so good we don't get the infection.
 
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