To not vaccinate my children against flu this winter?

[Isseyesque]

We have been offered flu jabs for DDs age 2 and 4. Neither have any respiratory/asthma type issues, and generally very good health (have been very fortunate in that to date they have rarely gotten ill and never seriously, not been on antibiotics etc).

AIBU not to vaccinate them as they don't appear to be high risk? My understanding is that flu is most dangerous to people with weak immune and weak respiratory problems. If they do get it, they'll be unwell but ok, and develop some resistance/ resilience etc.

However, I'm now wavering as someone said they heard on the radio that it recommended small children DO get immunised as it will reduce the spread of flu and therefore be better for others who are more compromised. I hadn't considered that previously, not sure what to do now.

YAB VVVV U, get the vaccination its life saving.

Never had flu. Will probably never have flu vaccine.

I thought similar till one winter my whole family got flu and I sat awake all night watching my daughter hallucinating and struggling to breathe and tried to decide whether to take her to the ER.

Now we all get the flu jab.

Purple our son came to us at three (by adoption) and he was eligible for flu sniff thing (I think even before he went to school). But dd (12) was never eligible for it so somewhere around here it is sometime between those two ages.

"Go back 120-150 years on one of the family history websites and find out what your ancestors' children died of."

YY to this. In the case of my maternal grandmother, two of her siblings died in childhood in a diptheria epidemic. (She died in middle age of sepsis, shortly before penicillin became widely available). My great aunt was left disabled by childhood TB.

Purple what's the cdc? Why are they advising against it?

Our cut off is year 4 older dd has missed it every year but I always get her done privately and have done since she was three.

I get a free flu jab through work and they have told us a severe flu outbreak is expected this year - don't know how true this is.

I will get my Dcs jabbed too I think - they are aged 17 and 19 and don't get it free but the local chemist does it for a tenner - won't exactly break the bank and worth it I think. I had flu 5 years ago and really felt like I was going to die.

CDC is Center for Disease Control, in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. It is a US government public health body. They recommend the shot as the nasal spray has not been effective since 2013 in children 2-17.

I have never got my DD a flu jab, even though she was 8 weeks prem. I am supposed to get it as I have a heart complaint but never take it up. We both stay alive!

DH and I have flu vaccines via work but I have declined for the children - my DM, who looks after them, is on immunosuppressants and DS1 has an egg allergy. I am relying on the herd immunity of others to help protect them.

The flu immunisation programme for children in U.K. is mainly for herd immunity thus protecting other vulnerable people like the elderly. Children in school and nurseries are known for spreading disease as they're touching and coughing sneezing over each other. It only protects against 3 main strains of virus and it's decided the spring before what 3 strains are chosen. There are thousands of strains so if the scientists get it wrong and there's another bad one then that's when we get an epidemic. They don't get it wrong most of the time though. I used to be an immunisation nurse.

So can anyone tell me if the flu strains in this years vaccine are the ones that are prevalent this year in Australia?

As I have said, in Australia children are not given the flu vaccine which may be one reason why the virus has spread.

All my family in Australia have had the flu this year. They are all asthmatics and were fine after a few days.

When I was in hospital with complications from the flu about 5 people died on my ward in a week. All were fit and healthy people in their 20s.

One of of my best friends at uni died of flu age 18. He went home for Christmas and never came back :-(

WaxyBean are you vaccinating your other children? If not, and given you're relying on herd immunity for your mother and son, I guess it's reasonable to expect people not to bother if they have nobody close to them at risk.

I've never had a flu vaccine and I've never had the flu in over 13 years. Also you might want to research vaccine shedding, because vaccines spread illness stop stop it. Here immunity is a load of rubbish

BeALert I am so sorry to hear about your friend. My friend also died at Christmas, during the holidays at uni, but from a different illness. It was very sad.

I do agree with a PM who questioned what people self diagnose as flu

I've only ever had flu once
I've had other achey I'll cruises

Flu is not curl up on the sofa with a hot drink feeling sorry for yourself ill.

Flu is not eating or drinking to the point of clinical dehydration, being unable to move from bed even if you need something, struggling to breath and wondering if it's ambulance time. I lost a stone in a week!

"achey ill viruses"

Forgiveness
'Retreat... the answer is hygiene, sanitation and nutrition.....'

For polio? Really? Whooping cough?

I have experienced a whooping cough outbreak. FWIW, a large cohort of clean living kids at a Steiner school. There were hospitalisations and literally months of illness for the kids involved. If only those parents had fed their children properly and done a bit more housework, eh?

I thought we were talking about flu.... where have I mentioned polio or whooping cough????

Tom Jefferson, author of a Cochrane Review on Vaccines for Prevention of Influenza in healthy children, said in 2014 that he would not recommend the nasal spray vaccine because the trials understate possible harm. "Influenza vaccines are about marketing and not science," he said. "We have few trials, and masses of very poor quality observational evidence," he said. "We have presented evidence of considerable reporting bias, which governments continue to ignore. The science is missing and so making an informed decision is very difficult."

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/oct/05/government-wrong-nasal-spray-vaccine

Last year 3 healthy dc in the U.K., who qualified for the vaccine but parents chose not to, died. One was a 5 yo girl near us. I have 3dc and 2 are entitled to the vaccine (both just turned 6). I couldn't live with myself knowing I could have prevented it. It's be shown to be safe so why there's so much discussion and misinformation baffles me. Truly concerning. The UK is very different to the USA and "marketing" vaccines not a thing.

Forgiveness, my initial comment re. family history was responding to a PP upthread who rubbished all vaccinations. I see that your response to my response (!) was specific to flu. We're talking at cross purposes.

mother It is NOT shown to be safe. Adverse reactions to the flu nasal spray are well documented.

Also worth noting that the vaccine only protects you if they get the strain of flu correct - which they haven't this year. So you are no more protected with the vaccine than without.

StarUtopia would you be able to link to examples of the flu nasal spray causing adverse effects, please?