Not to give my child Flu jab

[Binjob118]

My son is 6 and has been offered the nasal flu jab at school. He has had it the last 2 years and had no problems, but I now feel reluctant to give it to him. Does a healthy child really need this? I have to admit this change in my thinking has come about since the COVID vaccine rollout and the many vaccine injuries that seem to be being ignored by the MSM.

Those things are entirely unconnected. Flu vaccine doesn’t stop you getting colds, or have anything effect on anything but flu.

Not having caught flu last flu season has no impact on whether you might be unlucky enough to catch it this time round. I cannot follow your logic in refusing it this year.

I would never tell a parent what to do for their children, but I wish people would base decisions on actual evidence.

Edited for a rogue extra word.

@infinityminusone Unfortunately whilst that is true it's not useful in the case of flu. There's a lot of variants circulating at any one time and it evolves quickly. Which means even if the antibodies stick around longer than from a vaccine, your immunity won't cause your immune system won't recognise the newer variants well enough.

That is one of the arguments used for allowing chicken pox to circulate though. There isn't enough evidence of vaccine immunity over a lifetime compared to disease immunity. However the chicken pox vaccine can be boosted if required.

My 3 year old won’t have it as she is autistic and it would traumatise her but she’s still breastfed so will get immunity as I have a flu jab. My older dc have it if they want it (also autistic and we let them choose)

Fine. Enjoy all that time off work you’re going to have to take when he gets flu then!

Have you ever had proper flu Op? I did once and I’m otherwise fit and healthy, no medication at all, no pre existing conditions, it FLOORED me. I was in bed for 5 days and barely made it to the loo.
my whole family get the flu jab, me included.
my Friend is a Dr in A and E, a healthy Mum in her 30s died last flu season, from flu, no other conditions.

I get the vaccine every year on NHS due to a medical condition. My DH doesn't. He hates needles. Got flu 5 years ago and has booked a paid flu vaccine religiously for himself every year as early as possible since. Flu sucks. I'd give it to my child personally, it does protect them as well as other vunerable people.

I've had flu once and I don't want it ever again
I started with norovirus and without being too graphic I was in the toilet hundreds of times a day for 48hrs
Woke up on day 3 thinking "oh I don't feel sick... wait why am I sweating?"
16 days in bed and I lost 2 stone, couldn't do anything at all and the doctor did a house visit because I was so sick

Yes but only because I'm pregnant

I would only consider a flu vaccine for a young child if they were in regular contact with very vulnerable adults.

He probably enjoys a few days not being harangued by his wife, tbh.

FIL is an OG antivaxxer. Mind you, he also believed that eating three bananas a day would cure him of the multiple strokes he'd had aged 63 because he'd refused to do anything about high cholesterol because it would involve medication and pictures or ornaments of elephants in the house cause autoimmune diseases like Psoriasis.

DP gets vaccinated every year to firstly protect me in case he brings it back from work before my immune response has fully developed and secondly because he's actually quite pleased that he hasn't had flu or Covid since. He's seen me with flu and with Covid prior to the first vaccine and never wants that to happen to me again if there's anything he can do that can reduce the risk.

The article is specifically about flu, though.

it is at least partly true that kids are given it mainly to protect the older population....older people have far less of an effective immune response to the flu jab ,and some years the effectiveness of the jab on offer that year has been as low as 10%, so the aim is to reduce the levels of circulating virus by targeting children instead....particularly because a not insignificant proportion of elderly people refuse it themselves! I suppose it's whether you think the primary aim of vaccination is to protect the recipient or to protect the community - personally i think it should be primarily the former and not the latter. As I'm chronically ill with auto-immune problems and have history in my family, i wouldn't choose to give a yearly vaccine to my otherwise healthy children (as the third covid vaccine triggered problems in myself and the first vaccine in my sister ,we are no longer confident how repeated vaccines affect our auto-immunity ) .....but i would feel differently if i was elderly or vulnerable in other ways, or if they were vulnerable themselves.

That's not the point of the research though. This is the point:

"A better understanding of the questions listed above and the differences between natural virus infection and vaccination will allow us to design better vaccines. The ultimate goal is to develop a universal influenza virus vaccine that induces long-lived protection against drifted seasonal, zoonotic and pandemic influenza virus infections."

^^ Disease-induced immunity lasts longer - but because of the number of variants and speed at which it evolves your natural immunity doesn't actually protect you for very long even if the antibodies last for a long time.

The research is to consider how they might make the vaccines more effective by understanding more about disease-induced immunity.

YANBU

My kids have never had it

That is as maybe but doesn’t change anything I said. Everyone gets the jab, not just children. I’m saying that they’re not being “used” to protect the elderly in some kind of unethical way, as some people seem to be implying.

I see what you're saying, however, other recent studies point to early imprinting preventing certain flu strains in old age. I can't find the exact article I read this in (quite a while back), but this one also points to it: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/british-actuarial-journal/article/agedependence-of-the-1918-pandemic/3BCBF4BDFBD8C5F0F4FBFDF34DF42209

Yep I get it every year, not on the NHS I pay for it.

Mine have had it and will again this year. I'm grateful to have the option for them to have it.

Thank god for vaccines, they're a large reason for us living beyond 50 and living healthy lives.

I'm not an anti-vaxxer and have had most jabs, but I avoid the flu jab. Three years in a row I felt so awful afterwards I was in bed and off work for a week. I didn't feel that much worse with actual flu, and since I've only had that twice in 40 years I'll take my chances.

My 7 year old has had the flu twice. First time he ended up in hospital, for 5 nights. Last year he got it again. I genuinely thought he was going to die, it then passed on to me and his little 1 yo brother. It was horrific. We are all getting the flu jab this year!

You said "nasal jab". The word jab means an injection, so you appeared to think this was some kind of injection in the nose. The fact that the nasal flu vaccine is not an injection seemed a relevant point.

Also, I am admittedly a bit of a pedant, but this means I like to be told if I'm using a word incorrectly. I thought you might also like to know. If nothing else, it might save confusion in any conversations you have about this in "real life"!

A kid in my sons school has leukaemia - if she got flu she could die. I know she could catch it anywhere but sense dictates she’s more likely to get it from school. It’s not just about your own child is it?

& I have the flu jab every year and I swear that since getting it I am ill far less over the winter and when I am it’s often more short lived.

I know it’s personal preference but it does make me sad sometimes to see the attitude “it doesn’t directly affect my child so fuck everyone else”

Nope I am not a scientist or a doctor, so I’ll trust their expertise. Instinct means nothing when it comes to the facts and evidence of medical science-based vaccines .

” I never had flu so I don’t see the point”
” jab”
“msm”
🚩🚩🚩🚩

I have had the flu vaccine twice

Both times I went down with what felt like terrible flu and was bed bound for weeks

Never again.

Years later I had an allergy test done and apparently I am allergic to a couple of things that are in both the Covid and flu vaccines.