Hello lovely people,
I am in a quandry and whilst I knuw no one can tell me what to do, I wondered if anyone had any advice on whether to have my baby vaccinated.
The internet is a powerful tool but the chat forums seem to send me around in cirlces. All I want is what is best for my little girl and to protect her from any harm, and am worried by allowing her the vaccination, I might cause more harm than good?
Thoughts welcome xx
Hi Angelcakes, we can't tell you whether to let your little girl have the vaccination or not, but I can say if it was me and it was my baby, I wouldn't let her have it, mainly due to the ingredients in it and possible side effects.
Hope this helps and doesn't make you feel any more confused. Good luck with your decision xxxx
If this is specifically about swine flu vaccination as opposed to all the others, then the official programme of vaccinating children has been withdrawn but curiously won't actually stop until the end of March. So I would put off deciding until April. Swine-flu (such as it was) is over. The WHO are now being investigated by several countries over its handling and hyping of the whole affair.
There's lots of info out there, on this and vaccination in general, the questions I think are relevant are:
1) is it safe
2) is it effective
3) is it necessary
4) how does it compare to, or affect, other ways of staying healthy
I would suggest keep these in mind and try to look beyond the hype and emotional blackmail (plenty exists in both directions), and navigate as far as possible on the evidence.
Additionally, your doctor should be able to provide the evidence to answer these questions about treatment, but there will be other data out there also, and other ways to interpret what is known. You are entitled to a FULL risk-profile under the rules of informed consent. Every treatment has risks, and nothing is 100% effective, so don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
If no clear picture emerges, then you have to err on the side of caution - and that means whether you prefer the risks of vaccinating, or of not vaccinating...
Hope that helps,
Good luck!