Now that the swine flu vaccine is available in some states, have you gotten it yet, do you plan to get it, or is that even in your state yet? I live in Michigan and we don't have that option yet.

    

I live in Florida and we have the swine flu vaccine here. In fact, my daughter just came home today from school with swine flu paperwork for us to look over. We also got a consent form to fill out so she can get a free voluntary swine flu vaccination at her school. We are confused about it.

We have heard a lot of mixed reviews about this vaccine--even some doctors here are choosing not to vaccinate their kids with it. We are considering not getting it. I am curious to know how others feel about it too. So right now I really don't know if she is getting it or not. We only have a few days to think about it. I understand swine flu is serious but I just don't know...

If it was in Michigan, would you get it?

Oh.. We don;t have it here yet, but I have been thinking about getting it for my toddler, if and when it is made available here. I know there are reports abt it not being safe, but I haven't come across any formal medical announcement as yet. So, I guess it is better to be safe than sorry and get the vaccine. I will be happy to know of any proper reports backing up claims that it isn't safe and then I could think again, till then, I will go ahead with the vaccine.

The vaccine isn't available in Texas yet but we wer thinking of getting it. My son came home from school asking to get vaccinated. He's in 6th grade and I guess the school has been telling the kids about it. I hear the swine flu is really bad. It's supposed to be way worse than the regular flu and that's bad enough!
We were considering getting our son vaccinated but after reading your post I am not too sure anymore. Can you please show me the info that says the vaccine might not be safe? I would like to read it and to see where the info came from. I don't want to put my son's life in danger but it would be a mistake to skip the vaccines only to find out later the info about it not being safe was wrong. Did you get the info from a credible source?

Sorry for all the questions but I like to cover all my bases before we do anything.

I am not sure what to do about vaccinating my son. I work as a respiratory therapist and have seen really sick people on ventilators from the swine flu. But my son’s doctors did not recommend it. I know side effects are rare, but still I am a bit worried about them.

I ended up declining the swine flu vaccine for my daughter. Since the vaccine was released here, everyone has been talking about it. The local news has been flooded with mixed reviews, the newspapers ran stories about it, and chatter in the pediatricians office was enough to help me make up my mind. When a pediatrician makes a statement like" I can not recommend a vaccine to a child that I would not give my own"... it just makes you think. My husband and I were already on the fence about it anyway.

Swine flu already affected several kids here where we live and based on what we have seen, we feel secure not getting the vaccine.

Of course, there are many doctors and others who highly recommend getting vaccinated. This was our personal choice and I feel secure in the decision we made. I did read a ton about it online, but actually one of the articles that gave me the most information was this one:

Swine Flu Article