Have you ever avoided a vaccination for yourself or your child for fear of its possible side effects?

I'm old and when I was a kid getting vaccines was not questioned. And, I have no kids.
But, I support vaccination and it worries me that some parents have been not doing it.
On a meta-level, I find it kind of interesting how our society seems to be slipping backward on this.
It seems to show that we're not entirely capable of sticking to something for more than a generation or two.
Or, that we have a tendency to question authority, which is mostly a good thing, but perhaps this is one bad side-effect.

Yeah, flu shots. I don't trust them. In the Navy I had to take to flu shots and they made me sick every time. I have not had a flu shot now since 1975, I won't take my son for one either. Some of this may be from the memory of problems with the swine flu shots in 1976 as well.

Yes for myself. I avoid flu shots. I used to take them regularly because in my limited wisdom, I thought that since I got the flu alot that I would get a flu shot and than I wouldn't miss so much work. I now realize in my somewhat more evolved limited knowledge that that was a dumb idea. Flu shots do not cure you of the flu, they duct tape it with heavy toxic metals and other viruses. come to think of it, isn't that how they battle terrorists? Force other terrorists to invade and kill and than worry about those terrorists later when awful symptoms arise?
I stopped taking the flu shots because the long term exposure to those is far worse than having the flu. Rather than inject myself ewith toxic garbage, I chose instead to encourage my immune system to do what is designed to do.
Oh, and I rarely get the flu now since I stopped doing it the government way.

No, just no.

Personally, I don't like vaccinations. If I had it to do over, I would not have given my children any vaccinations but it was demanded by our government schools. I have a problem with it, not only to the side effects, but what a way for the control of our people. I feel if our immune systems were kept up to par, we wouldn't need them. When our immune systems become compromised, our bodies are carrying around a "bug" that will weaken us, like a time bomb. Just think of all the medicine that will be needed...someone will be making a profit.

I would only avoid vaccination if there was a clear medical contraindication (such as immune suppression). Vaccination saves lives. Those who elect not to vaccinate their children as recommended are not only endangering their own children, but also the wider population. I understand why many parents may be hesitant when it comes to vaccination, as there has been a lot of bad (but unfounded) publicity lately, but some of them take that to a level of such utter ignorance that it must take some serious willpower to be that stupid. Of course, the complementary therapists who feed into that by offering "homeopathic vaccination" etc. are also hugely at fault.

> I would only avoid vaccination is there was a clear medical contraindication
> (such as immune suppression). Vaccination saves lives. Those who elect
> not to vaccinate their children as recommended are not only endangering
> their own children, but also the wider population. I understand why
> many parents may be hesitant when it comes to vaccination, as there
> has been a lot of bad (but unfounded) publicity lately, but some of
> them take that to a level of such utter ignorance that it must take
> some serious willpower to be that stupid. Of course, the complementary
> therapists who feed into that by offering "homeopathic vaccination"
> etc. are also hugely at fault.

ditto and here here!! well said........

Anthrax, after having an adverse reaction

I won't get a flu vaccine because of the risk of Guillain-Barré Syndrome. I'd rather have the flu, thank you.

I would give my child all the normal childhood vaccines, though, like polio, measles, mumps, etc. Those are too dangerous to mess around with.

I believe I might not have been innoculated against german measles because I had really bad eczema as a child. I don't have that funny skin thingy on my arm.

I've been considering a survey like this for a few months, but haven't made the effort. An episode of Private Practice made me think of it. A mother with children took her family to the doctor's office. Her eldest became autistic after vaccination, so the mother refused vaccination for her other two sons. One of the two non-vaccinated sons need the vaccination to recover from a life threatening illness and the mother was still inclined to refuse treatment, rather than sentence another child to an imprisonment of his own mind.

Didn't you just hate the season finale of Private Practice?

Yeah, that was a really crappy cliffhanger to have to wait for -- I think Pete or Sheldon will stop by and save the day.

Never.

No - though I don't get do a lot of doctor visits

A time or two... I hate shots so missed some flu and similar shots on purpose..

Yes.

What about for chicken pox and HPV?

I would have my child get those, too. Chicken pox isn't that bad (I had it when I was a kid and I was fine), but if you can get rid of it, why not? And HPV is a definite--that's potentially life-saving. I wish they'd had it when I was young enough. But these are vaccines that you get once and that's it. The flu vaccine may not even keep you from getting the flu, you're supposed to get a new one each year, and the risk of death isn't great enough to justify putting yourself at risk for GBS.

Did you vaccinate Mary?

Yep... and I don't give a crap what the doctors say... She changed after the MMR. Vaccinations would be great, if they didn't have so many damn side effects.

I refused the chicken pox vaccine for her as it was still very new. I was concerned about unknown side effects. She ended up getting two very mild cases of chicken pox (same thing happened to me as a child)... I feel the same way about the HPV vaccine. It's brand new, we are being told that we should pump it into our children.... but who is to say 10 years from now, these children who get the vaccine won't start having deformed babies or something just as terrible?

I can see that; in cases where it's not a question of global public health, I can understand not opting for the vaccines. But for diseases that could easily make a comeback, I think there's something to the argument that it's freeloading to rely on others' immunity by not having your own child immunized. No one wants to take the risk in vaccinating their own kid if they think it might cause things like autism, but it's true that there's a larger communal risk in letting some diseases make a comeback. Not having a kid, I guess I can't really say what I would do in the actual situation, but I think I would at least get the basics like polio and MMR, as well as DPT.

Catching the flu can also lead to GBS so I'm not sure that's a good reason to avoid flu shots. And the link between GBS and flu shots was a one time event as far as I've read. Of course, this past winter I had a flu shot and caught the flu anyway. That was unpleasant but at least I didn't get GBS.

Sure, but you also might not get the flu, with or without the shot. And Adam got a flu shot a couple of weeks before he got GBS; I've read that there's a continued connection, even though it's probably not a huge percentage of people who get flu shots who get GBS. Flu shots just seem pointless to me.