Pilot scheme at our school for flu vaccine, is it live?

[quickchat]

The school my DS attends has started a pilot scheme to give all children a flu vaccine (sprayed up the nose). As usual most parents whom im sure do not lie awake at night worrying if their child will get a cold or flu are rushing head on to get it done .

Im wondering if this will cause big increases in flu itself as I know when my parents get their yearly flu jab they always end up ill with flu!!

I love when I ask the parents keen to get the flu vaccine for their child if they have looked into the contents of the vaccine (done very matter of fact, non confrontational) they look at me like I've just dropped my pants and had a wee at school drop off.

"Why on earth would I do that" their face tells me!

Also worth noting (again) that 'there is no firm evidence that mumps causes sterility' (HPA)

Quickchat: do you think this describes your attitudes fairly?

‘Trusting blindly can be the biggest risk of all’

It's hard for someone like me, who believes in the currently dominant view of vaccines as basically a good thing, to understand where you're coming from. Your opinions are obviously honestly held. Understand if you find it pointless or irrelevant or whatever.

(A lot of the time in threads like this it's like people have completely different views of reality (in particular around risks associated with vaccination and disease) and that paper is the best take on the difference I've seen so far.)

Hpa does not say that is no firm evidence that mumps causes sterility. It now says mumps seldom causes sterilityfor both men and women.

They seem to have changed their wording slightly but it still says:

"Despite common belief there is no firm evidence that orchitis causes sterility."

Orchitis being a possible complication of mumps.

I know this thread is about the flu vaccine but if what they are saying is that mumps doesn't cause sterility (btw this is the impression I was also under) then this is an even greater reason to avoid the MMR, it is to protect against infertility from mumps but if mumps doescnt cause infertility, then you are are vaccinating to prevent damage to an unborn baby from rubella, to protect from infertility from mumps (which isn't an issue cos mumps doesn't cause infertility) so really the issue is if you want your child to have 3 vaccines to protect against the measles that for most children isn't serious.

Frontdoor - is that satire?

Catherina, I could have worded it a bit better, however I think you can get the gist of it. We vaccinate against mumps to protect against adult male infertility but if mumps doesn't cause adult male infertility then why is the mumps vaccine needed, this is without even questioning why it would be needed at 13 months old and by girls, even if it did cause male infertility.

Quick chat, I am also concerned about the ingredients in the flu vaccine, and I will certainly avoid it.

Frontdoorstep
They do not vaccinate against mumps purely to prevent male sterility, although not sure from who BM is now quoting from as the HPA (now know as the PHA) actually says

[[http://www.hpa.org.uk/Topics/InfectiousDiseases/InfectionsAZ/Mumps/GeneralInformation/mumpsGeneralInfo/ Orchitis (usually unilateral) in up to 25% of post-pubertal males. Sterility seldom occurs.
Oophritis in 5% of post-pubertal females. Sterility seldom occurs.]]

Which clearly means that sterility can occur.

They vaccinate against mumps because of the risk of encephilitis and deafness, all of which have a far greater risk from the disease than the vaccine.

Back to the vaccine
what ingredients are you trying to avoid? You seem to rely on scaremongering websites for your information. Have you read the IOM adverse effects of vaccines and causation which looks at all the research on the complications of the disease and the vaccines

Back to the flu vaccine

As to avoiding ingredients in the flu vaccine, it contains pig gelatin which is a concern to Muslims. The vaccination programme in schools was temporarily suspended in Glasgow this week for that very reason. Now you might have thought that someone might have thought that that would be a concern to Muslims but obviously not.

Happy to reassure you

BBC News

"Parents should be reassured that the existing guidance issued in 2001 from the World Health Organisation, prepared by religious scholars, advises that gelatine of porcine origin used in vaccines and other medicines is judicially permissible as the gelatine in the final product is a completely changed substance.

Eg it was identified and cleared more than 10 years ago.

Thanks arkestra, I am aware of that statement and I am not Muslim so pig gelatine does n't concern me from that point of view. However it concerns some Muslims and the fact that pig gelatine was included should have been made clear and so should that statement.

Anyway, is that enough to reassure someone who objects to pig products?

When do you stop reassuring people explicitly over questions that have already been settled?

It sounds like the question was raised and settled more than 10 years ago. Your initial post gave the impression the question had never crossed people's minds.

It is possible that there is more than one interpretation under Islam here and that the people concerned are raising an objection according to a different interpretation from the WHO. Happy to see info on that if you have any.

Fair enough arkestra, but since the flu programme was suspended in Glasgow, it does n't seem to suggest that the question was answered and since the people who have concerns over the pig gelatine have been told they can have an injectable flu vaccine instead that would also indicate that question marks remain over the pig gelatine.

You are probably correct suggesting that there is more than one interpretation under Islamic law.

However I don't think this is the ingredient the OP was referring to and for me other ingredients concern me far more, more from a safety point of view than a religious objection.

The pig gelatine's not a bad example of where problems lie around vaccine communication. Questions are asked about a vaccine ingredient. They are settled (in the case of gelatin, I have been unable to find any disagreement with the religious position here).

Do you (1) include every such issue on every communication with the vaccine? (2) never mention any such issue? (3) be aware that the issues can arise and have a prepared response?

I think (3) is right. And I think that in the pig gelatin example people started at (2) instead and got wrong-footed as a consequence. Eg they did not have enough regard to local concerns. My guess is that we've had other vaccines with gelatin rolled out with no issues. This time the question arose, and people were caught on the hop.

This is a problem with centrally run programs of any description. I don't believe it necessarily implies a genuine underlying problem though.

I think UK MMR has gelatin for instance. If so would explain why flu vaccine distributors got caught on the hop by people protesting about Fluenz!