I have never done the flu vaccine for our family. For a lot of reasons, not the least of which is my belief that we should only use vaccines for illnesses we would rather take the risks of the vaccine versus the risks associated with the illness. Flu vaccines, unlike the standard childhood vaccines, still use thimersol as a perservative (mercury). Further, the vaccine is compromised only of the top 3 strains of influenza that crops up in the Asian world 18 months before its expected to hit us here in the US. Generally, that guess work can give a good estimate of what we're going to face. But, not always, especially not in this day and age when often we get strains coming on airplanes from LOTS of different places and the path of transmission does not always go Asia to America.
For most of us in this house, getting influenza is merely an inconvenience. We get sick for a few days and we recover. Until this year, it was a no brainer that we don't get the flu vaccine.
This year, M changed things. We lamented a LONG time about what course of action to take on this one. While I want to provide optimal protection for M, I also don't want to expose my other children to vaccines they don't need.
In the end, we vaccinated M and Dh. M is the one at high risk from influenza. And, DH is the main source of transmission in this house. In addition, I've noticed that since M started Occupational Therapy we've had a dramatic increase in colds coming into our house. So, my new thing is that I'm sanitizing the hands of the 2 children most likely to stick their fingers up their nose after we leave the therapy center every week. That means, M and the toddler get a good squirt of sanitizing gel as we walk out the door. I just started that *after* they brought home the last cold, so we'll see if it has an impact on what they bring into the house.
But, honestly, for the strains of influenze the vaccine protects against, it has a pretty high conversion rate. So, if we were to contract a strain that the vaccine has, M should have solid protection against that strain. If we bring in a strain not in this year's flu vaccine, the vaccine won't do a darn bit of good protecting M anyway, so there's no point in exposing his siblings to the vaccine to prevent a sickness that won't harm any of them in the first place.