For many years in the UK there have been public announcements made advising people to go to their GP's to get their flu jabs. Then in 2009 there was worldwide hysteria when the threat of swine flu and the inability to get the flu vaccine itself became global news. Was the population going to die on the scale of the 1918 Spanish Flu outbreak?
Luckily that flu strain threat subsided but ironically the threat of an avian spread flu has not gone away. It comes round every year yet since 2009 public announcements to advise people to go to their doctor to get their flu jabs seems to have gone quiet. Perhaps in the UK this is because of economic pressures on advertising budgets.
So whilst the fear of flu for most people subsided in 2010 it became a reality for my husband's cousin. She nearly died and spent the whole of December in a medically induced coma whilst doctors tried to save her life. She, like many others thought the risk had gone. Luckily she survived but the after effects are still ongoing.
This year again we have seen no advertising to date to prompt people to get their flu jabs. For some reason the understanding of herd immunity goes unregistered. Maybe it is because in the cases of flu, viruses can mutate, and people have adopted an attitude of let’s just hope none of our loved ones contract it.
I decided to take photos of myself getting my flu jab it was in part to take my mind off what was happening, but in part remind myself of the importance of why I am doing this. The nurse who administered it said they had never had anyone do this before!
I understand why people are scared at the mere thought of needles and of contracting a serious disease. Vaccinations, blood samples, or having any medicine administered via hypodermic syringe are not pleasant. Intellectually I know these are vaccinations are necessary. On a visceral level however, I have never personally contracted any of these diseases so my body revolts at the pain and violation of a needle being stuck in me.
There are of course no 100% guarantees with any medicine that there will be no side effects, that too is a worry. The same is true of the MMR vaccine, yet in the MMR case there are alternative choices. It takes three times the amount of injections to get them administered individually for Mumps, Measles and Rubella.
Have we now therefore developed such a phobia and distrust that we recoil instinctively when we are told that "this shot will be good for you"?
