Yesterday, I willfully, wantonly, and with parental and civic responsibility aforethought took my three children to receive the H1N1 vaccine. No one appears yet to have developed autism as a...oh, nevermind. I am pleased to report that Little Da, who at our previous appointment spent 20 minutes wallowing around on the floor at the doctor's office in a silent tantrum, stepped right up to the scale this time and snorted his vaccine like a pro. Yes, like a pro! The fun part was that it was absolutely free. I had a fleeting moment of feeling like I was part of the French healthcare system.
Strange to think that vaccinating my children could be a controversial decision on my part, but it is. Some people offensively assert that parents who do what I just did are abusing their children, purposely placing them in harm's way, carelessly exposing them to chemicals with names that the accusers, at least, don't recognize. Some people take it so far that they will send death threats to journalists who don't vilify vaccines and resort to sexist name calling, including prostitute and whore.
Sadly, everything they think, everything that worries them, is almost as dangerous a plague of viral verbiage as the real viruses that threaten those most at risk from the real and deadly diseases against which we vaccinate. The misinformation, the outright nonsense out there is legion. The rumor mill grinds out all of the facts and leaves only buzzwords that scare people to death, while leaving them and their children exposed to the possibility of dying from a preventable disease. Or worse, unintentionally infecting a member of a vulnerable population and killing them.
The passionately misinformed with their accusations of abuse and prostitution use hard words. But I'd take it all and more to do the right thing by my children and the society of which they are a part. I encourage any parents who vaccinate to make clear that they do the same.
5 comments:
Good for you, Emily. We need buttons: V for vaccinate, maybe?
When we finally get the H1N1 here, my husband, son and I will get it. My daughters already had H1H1 and it was a miserable, scary two weeks. What the heck is controversial over protecting your children from that? And seriously, they lose any credibility when they're the ones who line up to chelate, HBOT, or nicotine patch their children, but won't vaccinate.
We've had MMR, diptheria, tetnus, hepatitus (all pd for), meningitus (that one is only pd for those born after 2003 or so, we had to pay it out of pocket), we've caught the influenza twice (each child), caught the chicken pox, little boy at 13mths spent a week with the Norwalk and we were in emerg 3 days dealing with it that week. And at 10 and 8 have had enough rounds of antibiotics COMBINED to count on one hand.
My family Dr, and both Ped's (one retired) said when asked there was no reason to give a child the flu shots if you were a SAHM. Why?? B/c I was home and could and would take them out of school.
I have no intentions of giving them this flu shot either which the earliest I could is Nov 5th... I think... it was in today's paper.
I find it amazing how this year we only have H1N1... what about the other seasonal flu's or the head colds my boys have had this week.... more people died from seasonal flu on an annual basis than the H1N1 so far.
What was the 'flu' my boys got early last May (May was a crappy mth hence remembering when exactly and the fact I took pics of them sleeping, since we were off to the Dr's for something else that afternoon). Fever, sore throat, earaches and afternoon naps... little boy was off 2.5 days from school, eldest was off 0.5.
Stuff goes around.... as they've proven every flu season, just b/c you got the shot for one virus.. doesn't protect you from the rest of them. Just think of all those people that are not allowed to get the seasonal flu vaccine this year... b/c of it... how many will die???? AND, b/c of the hype... die unnoticed.
Having just gone through a miserable and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to get my G vaccinated, I am so impressed with Little Da!
We still have no H1N1 vaccine here. The flu shots were only here briefly, luckily we did get those in time. I do hope M can get the H1N1 vaccine. I am picturing huge lines though. Sigh.
This area ran out of reg flu and no H1N1 yet. We're on a waiting list. I am a little apprehensive since my little one got really sick after a flu shot when he was a toddler and then we found out he was allergic to eggs. He's outgrown the allergy though. The older one has done fine with all vaccinations including the flu. I have never had a flu shot in my life, but I tend to get weird things like mono, cytomeglovirus, etc in a bad way, so I think I will be getting the H1N1 vax to play it safe.
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