TimesOnline has just published an article on the NEW swine flu vaccine - and recommends that pregnant women ask for this in addition to last year's if they had it.

[JosephineClaire]

Has anyone else heard this?

I had a swine flu vaccine at about 10 weeks - I'm now wondering if I need another at 34 weeks...

Scarabeetle I did not call you or anyone else a fool or an idiot, I am really not that rude.

I said based on the evidence and comparable risks I agreed it was a foolhardy decision (as the medic quoted in the Telegraph said) not to have it.

I'm not the only person here saying they will have the vaccine. I bet most pg women will have it, if they look at the evidence anyway.

whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2010/9789241500111_eng.pdf

I am planning to have the vaccination - does anyone know if there are any problems with having it in the first trimester vs second trimester? ie is there any merit in waiting until I (hopefully) get to 12 weeks?

JeelyPiece what are you frustrated with?
Do you want people who don't want to have the vaccine to change their mind and have it or do you just want people to say 'yes you're right the risk is higher but I am still not going to have the jab'?

The risks may be higher but the overall risk of death or severe problems is not huge to start with anyway as far as I can see from what I have read.

Actually Jeely, most pregnant women won't have it. Perhaps more than last year, but not most. Here are the stats:
www.dh.gov.uk/prod_consum_dh/groups/dh_digitalassets/@dh/@en/@ps/documents/digitalasset/dh_114212.pdf

Dylthan - you're really quite wrong. Not all vaccines are the same. The inclusion of thimerosal in vaccines in the US has been hugely controversial and at least in some states in the US certainly it wasn't permitted for pregnant women in the past. In any case the suggestion that we should simply do what the US do is intellectually lazy, and dangerous.

Interestingly, when the British govt placed orders for millions of flu shots last year the pharmaceutical companies said they weren't done with their clinical trials - so the Govt indemnified the drug companies in order to fast track delivery. That's according to a report in the Times: "The Department of Health said yesterday that Britain would get sufficient swine flu vaccine and it would indemnify drug manufacturers if there were any serious side effects from the vaccine."

Hardly made me feel safe.

Do they offer it to all pregnant women whatever the time of year or is it just in the 'flu season' that they put this pressure on? Because if they only offer this in )Oct - Jan for example there are a lot of pergnant women who just won't have it.

Scarabeetle that link doesn't show what you say it does, the statistics are for uptake of all risk groups including pregnant women, not just pregnant women. And it shows last year anyway so cannot predict how many people will take the flu vaccine this year when fears about the vaccine having been 'rushed through' have subsided.

Dueling am frustrated at people not understanding risks. e.g. 'we can't calculate any meaningful risk because adverse reactions have been so rare' does not mean 'OMG they don't even know how dangerous it is!'. Also the fact that you are more likely to get flu than get an adverse reaction from the vaccine seems to be getting ignored by many.

hello everyone

This is a very interesting discussion so far. My situation is that I am 28 weeks with my first and also a biomedical research scientist. I will certainly have the jab if offered.

I would like to drift off and say, though, the autism / MMR and general scepticism towards vaccines is a sad reflection I think on the way science is reported in this country. Newspapers whipped up the story and OF COURSE people who are not expert or do not have a doctor in the family were terrified for their children and tried very hard to do their best. Everyone here is struggling through a very difficult decision. However, that does not change the fact that it need not be such a difficult decision, and would not be if clear, cold facts about risk were better known and more clearly explained.

I think it is outrageous papers can report the MMR story on the front pages so vigorously and then not clear the story up to such an extent a year later... they really should, in my opinion, in the interests of public safety do proper articles on what happened and why and how the link has been completely discredited. They could answer all of these sort of questions that you are all asking about jabs in general and SF in particular.

But I obviously live in an imaginary world where newspapers are run by sensible people

I wasn't saying we should do what the USA do. I was simple using it as an example of why your money conspirecy was absurd.

Any one that has to resort to childish name calling has lost there argument in my eyes so I'm naive and intellectualy lazy?

I also find it unbeleviable that someone continues to use newspapers as a source for information over and above actual medical reserch papers.

I suppose working in pharmacy for 8 years means that I know nothing of how vaccines work please enlighten me.

oh and Dueling Fanjo I think the idea is that pandemics and new flu strains appear in the Far East (generally) and spread over here by our winter, which is also when they are more easily spread, for reasons discussed before. So pandemics are far more likely to be around in the winter, and people who are pregnant in the summer should be protected by the previous year's vaccine. That does not mean that they will not catch flu in the summer, just that the chances are much lower, and if there is a freak summer pandemic the vaccine will already be available for use, from the previous winter.

they will only be protected by the previous year's vaccine if they were offered the vaccine the previous year which thay m,ay not have been if they didn't fall into one of the high risk groups the previous year, pregnancy being one of them. Also, don't vaccines and flu strains change year on year?

the swine flu vaccine is included in this year seasonal flu, makes sense really, one jab is cheaper than 2, pregnant woman need this vaccine because swine flu is really dangerous for mum and baby, you shouldn't get in the first trimestre, but they will explain that in your surgery, get some advice, they will vaccinate you as soon as it is safe to do...

the strains of flu change every year, that is why the global health organization recommend the 3 more common strains for the vaccine to every country, you are only protected from last year if it is the same strain with no mutations, unlikely...

go to the surgery and have a chat with the nurse, trust me they won't vaccinate anyone who is not at risk...they don't have much to spare.

Ladies, I discussed this yesterday with my obstetritian who is very experienced doctor. His advice to me was to not have a flu shot done, unless I worked in a public/crowded place (eg, airport, school, etc) and/or travel to work by train/tube. Having assessed the relevance of this to my situation, I decided to pass on the shot. The reality of it is that 1) there are many different flu strings and having a shot would make you immune to only one of many potential viruses, 2) the side affects this might have on the developing fetus in the future are unknown 3) in rare cases, it is actually possible to get quite sick after the flu shot. This is obviously a personal choice, and I can appreciate that opinions will vary. I just wanted to share what I learned with you all.

"I would like to drift off and say, though, the autism / MMR and general scepticism towards vaccines is a sad reflection I think on the way science is reported in this country. Newspapers whipped up the story and OF COURSE people who are not expert or do not have a doctor in the family were terrified for their children and tried very hard to do their best."

Oh please. Not having a doctor in the family does not mean one is stupid and terrified. My interest was awakened not by Wakefield but by the first study meant to reassure us: the retrospective Danish study of three million children. It didn't seem to show what the headlines claimed it showed: so I did subscribe to the BMJ and did read the paper -- and found that no, it didn't in any way demonstrate that there was no connection: in addition it was funded by Merck: and it was "whipped up" as the research that disproves Wakefield. It was at that moment I smelled an enormous rat. There were lots of lies and misguidance in there and they came from official sources.
If you're looking for reasons of loss of trust, it's got everything to do with the lies and fake reassurances offered by the government instead of real research.

So please, if you can manage to be less patronising, it would be appreciated.

Re: WHO: there's increasing concern at pharmaceutical influence there. Why this jab? Well, the government put in place a deal two or three years ago that if there was to be a pandemic GSK would be contracted to supply a vaccine. The government and GSK have a close relationship: very close. Staff cross over and so on. With great serendipity for GSK, along came swine flu, and along came the vaccine. But hmm, the swine flu scare-mongering didn't work quite as well as had been hoped and people became more matter of fact and blase, and they began to fear some of the ingredients in the vaccine: so take up was much lower than expected. Result: lots of leftovers.

I've been pregnant three times over winters and have never been told the flu is more dangerous in pregnancy, never been told it endangers the mother and baby, and I ought to have a jab or I'm being foolhardy. Never. It's been available but I have never been told this. There's a reason it's happening now, and it's a business reason, not a health-driven reason.

And I really have no patience with the accusation of paranoia. It's a wilful thing not to see it.

I have to say, if you want to believe in the altruism of government and manufacturers in this, you can do it by an act of will, but not by looking at the facts.

Bigkids: the link has not been completely discredited. Ironically, the "papers" claim that it has been: perhaps that is because they are not run by sensible people, as you suggest -- or perhaps it is because health correspondents stay in their jobs for years and years and years, with the same PR contacts in their phones, who supply them lunch, who are cosy with the government press office, and really it's just all too awkward and difficult to suggest that somewhere there is a missing piece.

Why is there mercury in the swine flu jab? I thought they had stopped using mercury in jabs, now? (Sorry to be behind the times.) For example, I think there is aluminium in the cervical cancer jabs instead of mercury? Anyone know which jabs have mercury, and which have aluminium please?

wow
this thread has got me thinking...

planning to TTC #1 in 2 months time.
I'm as anti-drug / anti-chemical / anti- hormones as you can get and cook as much as possible from scratch using raw (ideally organic, but plan to move to whole organic when actually pregnant) ingrediants.
I avoid aspartane like the plague, there is none in anyform in my house, and have already given up alcohol and caffine completley in prepartaion for TTC.

I do intend to vaccinate my babies but NOT until they are much older, (say over 12 months ish) ie not at 12 weeks, when all they have had is my breastmilk.
Am not convinced about vaccinations really (had a boss who used world wide evidence to convince me, and she chose not to vaccinate her children, but protect them by providing a nutritious diet and healthy lifestyle, which i agree is far superior to pumping chemicals into our systems)

Im now thinking should i get a vaccine for myself now, ie before i TTC.
there is no chance that i'll accept it while pregnant, and i dont really want it while i am TTC either.

Grrr its just so confusing... as my instinct is to be anti-vaccine.

It is scary isnt it?I dont think i will have it as i tend not to get colds and flu very often and when i had aflu jab years ago (was high risk due to chemo)i got quite ill with flu like symptoms.
Maybe we should all be allowed to take longer Mat leave so we can all finish now and stay away from germy people :o

ooh i like the idea of longer maternity leave...

will be in a room of 3 year old (kindergarten teacher) so will get coughed and spluttered on lots

i also never get any thing, dont pick up coughs / cold normally.

just worried that being pregnant will make me more likely to get it, will be in a school where everything goes rouns, and i dont wanna risk my baby

I just hope we're all wrong.

I hope there won't be more pregnant women affected by flu this year than non pregnant woman for the sake of those that are anti vaccine.

Equally I hope that the vaccine won't cause problems with people's children for the sake of those that are pro vaccine.

No one can be right here without a lot of pain and suffering happening to a lot of people. I really hope we're all wrong.

according to the NHS website it will only be offered if you didn't have the swine flu jab already (I had it last year as I work for the NHS)
"Also, this winter (2010-11), the seasonal flu vaccine will be offered to pregnant women not in the high-risk groups who have not previously been vaccinated against H1N1 (swine) flu."

yet this thread title says you should still have it even if had jab last year.
I'm confused?

our poster at work states that the swine flu is in this years seasonal flu jab, so if youve had it already you'll be having it again.

It is a bit confusing isn't it?

They want pg women who didn't have the swine flu jab last year to have it this year. Presumably if they had it last year then they would have had it because they were in an at risk group not because they were pregnant (although it's possible to be pregnant two winters on the trot I suppose - if you're a bit lax or a bit mad). So being in an at risk group they'd be eligible again this year.

But the jab is trivalent so there are other strains included in the jab this year.

And if you had it last year as an at risk group presumably you need it again this year for cover for the other two strains.

Apparently there was a discussion by the GMC regarding whether people needed to give specific consent for the swine flu part of this year's jab.

So is it right that the swine flu vaccine has mercury in it?

And that the cervical cancer jab has no mercury as a preservative, but aluminium instead?