The H1N1 Debate

Disclaimer: I completely respect the opinions and decisions of all parents as to whether or not to vaccinate their kids. Below is solely written based upon my experience and opinions.

Should I? Shouldn't I? Should I? Shouldn't I?

Remember when you played that game where you picked the petals? That's how I was feeling for the last while. Not sure whether or not we should get the flu shots.

In the end, we did get the shots... yesterday.

My decision weighed on a few things.

There have always been and will always be cases of people who have bad reactions to flu shots. I have read everything about things that can happen now, things that can happen later, etc. etc.

I would not intentionally give my child a medication or vaccine needlessly unless I thought there was a very good reason to.

Yes, the H1N1 is just a flu strain. But a nasty one. And I don't want to get it and be off work for a month. And I don't want to have a child who ends up in the hospital. So for me, the risk is greater that that could happen considering how easily it can be transmitted in the air through droplets when you don't even realize they are there. And even though my child doesn't go out much. It would only take one trip to the park or to the shopping mall to potentially catch it.

Cross my fingers. I hope that this isn't the case for us or anyone else. But who knows what the reality will be.

I have been informed from all sides I think:

~ I've read every article I've seen, watched all the TV posts, read about all the claims that the swine flu was developed by the government for population control, watched how it may cause neurological disorders. You name it, I watched and noted.

~ I spoke with my naturopathic doctor. Her opinion was that your body can fight it off itself.

~ I spoke to Matthew's pediatrician. He felt that he's seen cases in the city with really sick kids and parents have to weigh the risks of the shot vs the risks of getting the flu.

~ I spoke with an aquaintance who is an immunologist. She knows the science facts down to the details and studied them enough to get a master's in well, vaccines. She was vaccinating her kids ASAP.

~ I spoke with doctor's in the family who say most likely you will recover fine, but it's nasty and with little kids, you just don't know what their little bodies will do.

I saw how sick we all got last year and how sick poor little M was from just a regular old flu.

For me, the risk that M could get hospitalized outweighs the chance that something could happen from the vaccine. For this year, anyway. In another year, with milder strains, I might not choose to get him vaccinated. We didn't last year. But we did this year.