…I should get a flu shot. She works in public health, so she oughta know. However—and I don’t usually go in for theories of conspiracy—a very small part of me thinks flu shots are a government plot to inject the citizenry with nano tracking devices or microbes that beam thoughts into your head or, you know, syphilis. Also there are all those people who say they never get them and the one time they did, they got a terrible flu anyway. Also Lindy West says she’s definitely not. What to do?
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The Last Enemy rocks!
OK, so maybe I’m cynical, but I think of the flu and various other ailments as part of natural selection. If I catch the flu and die, then that’s that. At some point, we have to accept our own mortality. Ultimately, everyone’s gotta go. There isn’t enough room on this planet for everyone to live forever. There’s not really enough room on this planet for us as it is.
Point 1: The only time I’ve gotten the flu in the last 10 yrs has been only on the years I’ve decided to get a flu shot. However, I dont normally get the flu, or the pervasive cold that travels thru the office, home or peoples with children. I do wash my hands constantly and have conditioned myself to keep my hands away from my face, and keep my exposure to sick people to a minimum.
Point 2: This seems to be much more effective then the flu shot. While a lot of science goes into predicting what strains will be around…it ultimately is a guess so getting a flu shot doesnt garentee you wont still get the flu, and I understand that me getting the flu is interestingly coincidental, but seems to me that living a healthy lifestyle and practicing better hygeine is more effective at reducing risk then actually taking the shot.
Even if the CDC is off with their targeting of the two most common strains (they were last year, the prominent strain was a mutation), the flu shot gives you partial immunity, anyway. If this situation occurs and you get the flu, it is less severe than if you didn’t have the shot at all.
Sarah, why stop there? Go visit elderly people when YOU have the flu. Eliminate people breathing your air, drinking your water.
Getting sick keeps you healthy.
What doesn’t kill you protects you from getting worse things. Like how they recently found out that stomach virus keeps you from getting some cancers.
Remember that eradicating the sickle cell genes will erase all protection from malaria.
We walk a thin line. I’m not getting the vaccine.
Add asthmatics to the list of people who should get it no matter what. I didn’t get the flu for at least ten years, then got it twice in two years. This year I had to go to the hospital for a breathing treatment, and the nurse chastised me for not getting a shot. I don’t have a suppressed immune system, but I do have a lung condition that can kill me if it goes rampaging out of control.
Bellevue Ave, I’m not evil, and it’s not my place to play God. I’ve never had the flu, but when I’ve got a cold, I stay home from work and cancel my social plans to help prevent my friends and coworkers from getting sick too. I would never knowingly infect another person with a potentially deadly virus.
But I’m just saying. We’re all going to die. We’ve got to come to terms with that. And I see flu shots as a small denial of our mortality.
How are we supposed to make fun of rural bumpkins when so many of us (see the majority of comments above) are so dumb and anti-science?
You get a flu shot not for you, but for babies, pregnant ladies, old people, and people with AIDS who are variously susceptible to getting the flu, cannot be vaccinated, and/or may die if they catch the flu. Get vaccinated, or be complicit in spreading a disease that kills.
@58,
You can be a carrier of the flu for up to a week before you come down with it. So, please stay away from babies, elderly people, and the HIV-positive between now and late spring. Thanks.
@50 – couldn’t agree more.
Get the shot. Science is always better than superstition, but superstition feels stronger. I’ve usually gotten the flu shot, but two years ago, i skipped it. I got the flu twice in 3 months, lost 6 days of work that i could have used for vacation. I just think of it as my vacation protection plan now. Colds suck. Flu makes you go between wishing you would die and wondering if you will.
Bellevue Ave @18: Yes, “reminds” you…
I am not getting a flu shot even though my boss will pay for mine. The joy of winter is getting sick and coughing on babies.
yeah, why fight illness? it’s just flaunting life in the face of mortality.
Public Health Seattle King County employee, here. Thanks to @22 and @32.
Unless you never come into contact with children, or people who have children, or old people, you should get vaccinated.
You are also highly exposed to the flu/ likely to expose these populations to the flu if you:
Ride the bus
Work in a large office building with lots of people.
Don’t wait. Vaccinate 🙂
Neither a child nor a senior, I got a shot this year because last year I got the flu for the first time in over 10 years and I basically lost a week of my life in bed. Unable to do books, video, tunes, or sex. Barely any sleep or eating. Lost 5 pounds. And I never get sick.
Look at how the mortality spiked for the 25-34 age group in the first graph here in the 1918 flu pandemic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu
Also, a loss of 2.5+% in world population.
For $25 you can get the vaccine, at pharmacies for instance.
Well, at some point, we’re likely to have a really bad flu season, so yeah, get one.
Easiest way to cut your cases of flu in half are just to wash your hands with hot water and soap EVER time you go to the bathroom, though, and to use kleenex.
@65 has got it right. Get it, period. (& it amazes me that the same people who so rightly ridicule the Conservative tin-foil hat stories about Obama, will perfectly happily believe they can get the flu from the shot!!You know the supremely great artist Egon Schiele? If not, here:
http://images.google.com/images?q=Egon%20Schiele
He never got the chance to get one. Imagine if he could have though, and could have kept working past the age of 28. Why would you pass up would have saved him if it’d been around?
“a very small part of me thinks flu shots are a government plot to …”
Paranoia like that totally undermines all the great work you guys at The Stranger do to promote reason over ridiculousness. Or maybe Dan’s the only one who does that.
Three things:
1) Those mean doctors at Tuskegee didn’t actually *inject* people with syphilis. They simply withheld the diagnosis from the patient and deliberately didn’t treat them. Not really relevant, but I just like accuracy.
2) All of you dumbfucks who say “I never got the shot, and I’ve never gotten sick” are probably driving around without using your seatbelts. Keep at it.
3) The shot can make you feel crappy for the first 36 hours after you get it, simply because your immune system reacts to the vaccine. Call these symptoms “flu lite.” They are nothing compared to an actual influenza infection.
A doc recommended since I have no insurance a flu shot was a good idea. I’d been doing it for a while anyway… People who think shots are bad are silly. A few times my arm has been a bit sore, but generally I’ve had no reaction. I say get it. Esp since at the Stranger I’d think you have insurance?
@58, you win today’s award for the biggest idiot on the internet.
Unless you don’t buy food at a grocery store, enjoy the benefits of indoor plumbing, or visit the doctor.
In which case your the biggest idiot of the year.
How are so many of you confusing the influenza with a common cold? it’s not the same virus, dumbasses. One may keep you off work for a couple of days, but the other sends you to hospital.
The shot will not protect you from a common cold, but it’s going to protect you from contracting flu. It’s a good idea for everyone. It’s necessary for those who are not strong enough to live through a flu infection. simple as that.