Schools should offer yearly Covid jab instead of flu

[SteakBakesAndHotTakes]

If we can have one, Covid is more common than flu, spreads more easily than flu, and although flu causes more severe illness at time of infection, repeated exposure to Covid increases the chance of long Covid for the child and the rest of the family.

I would rather both but if we had to pick one, my kids have brought home Covid four times and I would rather they be inoculated against it.

I don’t agree with the OP but I’m not sure that’s a reasonable criticism. We don’t make it parents’ responsibility to pay for any other vaccines.

Absolutely!

Is there a nasal flu vaccination?

My husband went for his flu jab and was offered the covid jab on Saturday so took it. I privately thought he made the wrong decision as he is always more ill from the vaccine than covid and sure enough he was really ill yesterday.

Flu is only less common because of the jab. It knocks you out for two weeks and six weeks to really recover.

This isn't true at all. Flu can be mild, or even asymptomatic. People use flu to describe severity of symptoms but that's not how it works.

Fwiw I doubt the uptake of covid vaccines would be very high. It was only a minority who took it even when first offered.

If it works why hell you need it every year? Don't get a yearly bcg

They should offer both vaccines and both are serious illnesses. for those worried about covid vaccine side effects there is a vaccination called novavax which has an extremely low risk of side effects as low or lower than the standard vaccines that children get. Also covid isn't just a cold in children, it can cause a lot of long term health issues even though the acute phase is mostly mild, and each additional infection increases the risk. Putting your fingers in your ears and pretending it isn't happening isn't going to make it go away. https://www.newsweek.com/why-are-so-many-children-getting-long-covid-2080950
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1100158

Agreed - I hate when people say “oh well if you could so much as lift your head off the pillow there’s no way it could be flu!”

Most people aren’t tested when they have a virus, so people just have this incorrect logic of “the time I was very ill I assume it was flu, and I’m now not very ill so I’ll assume it is not flu”.

Do you not understand the reason behind yearly flu vaccinations and just think they must be ineffective?
The same reason for annual flu vaccines applies to covid vaccines.

The covid vaccines arent recommended for healthy children. Plus, it doesn't stop people becoming infected anyway so what is the point?

People are not logical at all, nobody had a cold for quite a long time, because covid was the only virus that exists

They’ve stopped offering Covid boosters to the young and healthy pop as the vaccine doesn’t stop spread and there is good levels of ‘immunity’ (specifically not unwell enough to need hospitalisation) in the population.

The children don't get 'flu jabs'.

It's a nasal spray.

There isn't a nasal spray for covid.

I’m more concerned about the people who were shielding for months but no longer getting vaccinated tbh. Your children are young and strong and appear to have survived their 4 episodes of Covid. I’m quite sure it will kill my clinicaly extremely vulnerable relative who at 72 will no longer be offered this vaccine.

Clinically vulnerable people will continue to be offered a vaccine:

ukhsa.blog.gov.uk/2025/06/26/whos-eligible-for-the-2025-covid-19-vaccine-or-autumn-booster/

Thank you - a voice of reason floating in a sea of denial.

Everyone who catches covid is at risk. Vaccine side effects are minimal in comparison to the long term impacts of the virus.

Actual science vs social media:

www.panaccindex.info/p/what-covid-19-does-to-the-body-seventh

You know better than all the experts who advise on this ?

Righto. 🙄

One of my mine has type one diabetes and his medical team actually advised against the covid jab due to the potential long list of complications the jab can give. He got type one diabetes after a bout of mild covid too. So if they are concerned about the potential deadly risks of a covid jab… says it all.

I agree OP. They should be offered both. However as you can see here, the amount of cray cray anti vax sentiment this would unleash would make it not worth it

Long covid is not a big risk on a population level.
The covid vaccine is a much bigger risk than the virus to healthy adults and children.
The covid virus has mutated so much that its now basically a bad cold for most people, unlike flu which still kills hundreds of thousands globally each year.
Can I ask why you are still testing for covid (assuming that you are to know that your kids brought it home rather than a cold)

Do you know how many different flu strains there are? The vaccine given for the strain that is most active and this year the flu is out pacing covid and it is a really bad one. We have a few people off right now at work and they have been off for weeks instead of a couple of days.

Not everyone gets free flu jabs

Without meaning to sound pedantic, it’s not schools that offer these vaccines. Schools are just a convenient venue.

Because the virus mutates as it moves from person to person around the world, unlike TB
each year scientists take an educated guess at how the flu and now covid viruses will mutate and tweak the vaccine to cover those changes but sometimes they get it wrong as they did with Ausy flu and then even though that years flu jab still gave some protection from the worst symptoms the death rate for flu spiked massively that year.
Basically flu, covid and the common cold (multiple different common viruses which covid is becoming another of) are unstable viruses which continuously mutates. Whereas TB, measles, chicken pox, mumps etc are stable viruses that dont mutates or change.

Exactly what I was going to say.

Flu is always the biggest concern. Even during peak COVID, flu was still killing a few thousand people, it just got buried under the COVID hysteria.