Swine flu jab. Is it necessary?

[flobadob]

My six year old son is being offered the swine flu jab through his school now but I'm wondering is it necessary or could it do more harm than good? From what I've seen of it the whole thing was blown way out of proportion.

[brenda]

flobadob-----have no knowledge of medicine or any expertise in health matters-- so my view only. I would not give my child this injection-- because I don't think it has been established long enough to know the long term side effects.There have been some adverse reactions to the injection , small in number, but I wouldn't like my child to risk it.
I also think this vaccine has been produced in excessive quantities , as a knee -jerk reaction to a possible pandemic.
There will be many other people on this site who will disagree,and may be those with specialist knowledge may help you further . Sorry not to be able help .

[Sqad]

H1N1 affects mainly the young and pregnant women.

It may cause deaths.

The vaccine is as safe as possible.

I agree with brenda......on balance, I would not have my child vaccinated.

[lollyone]

Really sqad?
I have a 13 month old and we decided not to give her it. Because of the reasons brenda gave. I don't actually know anyone else who has declined it and was beginning to doubt our decision. Feel better hearing that from someone with a medical background.

[jake-the-peg]

I believe there have been 360 deaths from swine-flu in the UK

I don't know of any confirmed deaths from the vaccine

The risk is between a very small risk and a probably non-existant one.

Personally if it were my children I'd have the vaccine because if there was a problem I'd at least feel that I'd done all that I could

[feebal]

I have a 16 month old daughter and we have also decided against the vaccine, for the reasons already listed above. It's a scary decision to make.

[omnom]

It was blown way out of proportion.
My brother, his friend and myself have what we believed to be swine-flu and it just comes and goes.
If you are healthy, then I wouldn't advise personally to get the injection but if you have long-term illnesses or if you are pregnant or quite young then maybe it would be safe to as it says on the advert.

omnom

[ganesh]

There aren't any confirmed deaths (yet) from the vaccine but who knows what may happen in the future? Side effects aren't always immediate and it is still a gamble.I would never trust anybody saying things are perfectly safe,you can never be that sure with any drug.
If you don't have it you could (unlikely) die from the flu virus. These decisions are always a gamble but I wouldn't give the vaccine to a healthy child.
My son (15) apparently had swine flu a couple of months ago,had an extremely high temperature for 4 or 5 days but wasn't all that 'ill' with it.
I have had the normal flu before and that made me extremely ill and I ended up in hospital with it's complications.
I think there has been an over-reaction but maybe that over-reaction is the reason it hasn't become the serious pandemic that was going to wipe out half the population!

[mummyhodge]

people that have died from swine flu haven't actually died from the flu itself but from other things, i.e bronchitis, asthma, heart weaknesses, if you have a low immune system swine flu will weaken your immune system and you are more likely to get these things with it, which are what is killing people, my advice is: if you suffer from any chest/heart weaknesses or problems anyway, get it done, also if you are young, get it done, the child is a lot more at risk of picking up these other things than an adult is as their immune system is not as strong as an adults.