Lots of Questions About Swine Flu and Vaccines

D.,

There is so much information out there it makes it hard to decide on this one. My brother is a respiratory therapist who works with primarily children, however, given the number of severe cases in pregnant women, he has been working with pregnant women. When he called me upset after losing a 24 week mom and baby, he told me I HAD to get the vaccine. He's not an emotional person, so when I heard his voice, I knew.

I'm in Houston and waited in line 7.5 hours (I'm 21 weeks along) to get some of the first doses of the injection. I had no troubles with the vaccine. My 10 month old son also had his first of 2 H1N1 vaccines and we go back in a month for his second. My husband also got one. NONE of us had complications. My brother, his wife and 2 oldest got the vaccine without complications also – the youngest is 3 months and can’t have one yet.

I think this is a personal decision and I think you'll get advice from both views. To me, the decision was based on my brother and my doctor's advice...Get it, period!

Good luck!

I know two families who were recently diagnosed with H1N1. One family one of their girls (they have 6 children) has serious asthma so when her brothers were diagnosed with H1N1 they gave her Tamiflu. She still got the virus.

But here's what these moms said- the virus lasted about a week, with three days being the worst of it. Lethargia and a high fever (103) during that time. Really that's shorter then the regular flu to me. But to someone like my husband who is going through chemo and has asthma it could be dangerous because of the possible development of pneumonia.

I have chosen not to vaccinate for flu or H1N1, but rely on good nutrition and probiotics. We started coughing and feeling bad and it lasted two days and didn't get to be bad at all. We didn't go to the dr so I don't know what it was.

Something to consider about H1N1 is that fewer people have died from complication of H1N1 then the regular flu (.5 % verses .7%) Those who die from it have other serious problems (they were not healthy to begin with.) So if your children are healthy I wouldn't worry so much about it. Exposure seems to give immunity (people 65 and older seem to not be getting it as they were exposed to a very similar swine flu decades ago. That is widely known, stated on Web MD and other reputable sources.)

I know that a lot of people think that Mercola is a quack but if you consider that his information comes from valid sources, it shouldn't matter what his reputation is.

http://search.mercola.com/Results.aspx?k=h1n1

My kiddos had the swine flu shot and did fine. We get the regular flu shot every year and the injectable vaccine is made the same way by the same manufacturers, just with a different strain this time (H1N1). http://www.cdc.gov/H1N1FLU/

I've known people who had the swine flu already, without any more symptoms than the regular flu. However, each year a certain percentage of people and children die from the flu (and not all fatalities are those with underlying conditions).

My biggest concern with the swine flu is there is less natural immunity in the population to this strain, so most people are going to catch it (and help spread it).

I wouldn't recommend the flu shot to a family with a history of bad shot reactions or egg allergies.

HTH.

Hey there,
I think the whole controveresy about the swine flu is a bunch of hype. If you do your homework, you'll see that the swine flu vaccine is safe and is made just like the regular flu vaccine--it just protects you from a different strain of influenza. The main reasons why people are freaking out is because a swine flu vaccine in the 1970's gave some people a disorder called Gullian Barr. Since then, they have not had any problems with the flu vaccines. And people are concerned that it's being manufactured so quickly. But wouldn't people be up in arms if they had taken their sweet time? In actuality, it's not that it's being "sped up" (you can't make it grow faster)--it's just being grown on a much larger scale than usual because production was started later than usual. My kids have had the vaccine (it's been about 2 weeks now) and they are fine. No one's tail has curled yet! =) Do your research with people that know what they are talking about---your physician, the cdc website, etc. I would definitely get vaccinated. We know a little girl who was previously healthy, got H1N1 at the end of September, it turned into staph pneumonia, she was put on life support, given a 5% (that's 5, not 50) chance, had multiple problems while on life support (including a massive stroke) and is now unable to use the right side of her body. Thankfully, she has survived, but she is now on her way to a rehab hospital to try and regain some of the function in her right side. She was in Texas Childrens' Hospital PICU for 5 weeks. So....if you ask my opinion, it's a big YES! But you have to make that decision for yourself. Use your motherly instincts and you'll make the right decision.

Good luck!
A.