If you had kids...Would you allow your child to receive a swine flu vaccine?

[angus]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091007/ap_on_he_me/us_med_swine_flu_vaccine_fears

Apparently 1/3 of parents won't allow their children to get it.

Maybe they just don't "contribute to the movement."

There is a difference.

[angus]

My wife and I are like most parents, I suspect.  We have discussed the vaccination a few times.  But we have never made the 8.7 mile trek to his pediatrician just to get it.  In fact, since first hearing the term "h1n1 virus" back in april, I have made the ten-thousand mile trek to china, and back, the one-thousand mile trek to panama city beach, florida, and back, each once, as well as the 8.7 mile trek to his pediatrician several times, for various ailments including viral and bacterial infections that children generally tend to share with one another while sharing hugs, crayons, and boogers, and never once has it occurred to me to ask his pediatrician to ask him to stick my child with a long needle to help him avoid some flu that, odds are, he'll never catch anyway.  Call it a "bad attitude" if you like, but I suspect that we are like most parents.  We have excellent insurance, but insist that we know what is and isn't good.  All of which goes to show you that it'll take a whole lot more than breaking the bank to get American longevity to equal Danmark's or Norway's. 

Until I or somebody in my family actually is diagnosed with H1N1 virus, it doesn't become a motivating factor.  And it's the same way with most ailments for most Americans.  It's just our culture, and no amount of money thrown at the problem is going to change that.

But trying to argue against socialized medicine with any standard Democrat is rather like trying to argue against neo-imperialism with your average Republican. 

Or haven't you noticed?

[angus]

Hmmm.  I highly doubt that you took my point.

Anyway, I didn't vote in this poll, for what it's worth.  None of the options really fit.  And I suspect that would have been the case with the actual respondents of the actual poll cited.

[angus]

Commentary on the thread, I suppose.  More likely on the phenomenon in general.  Seems that there are those who are really paranoid about stuff and those who aren't.  Two types of people:  Some folks lock their doors.  Some folks don't.  That sort of thing.  I suppose I'm a low-security sort of person, and I alternate between mild amusement and severe frustration with those high-security types.  The types who make me take my shoes off in the airport.  Or who make me change my password every six month.  Oh, and it has to have at least one of these characters:  &, *, !, $, or ^.  And some capital letters and some numbers.

I saw an interview with a woman on CNN a couple of nights ago who was at a clinic.  She had taken her small daughter to get a seasonal flu vaccine.  We take my son as well.  Every year about this time, though I can't ever remember getting a flu shot personally.  Don't intend to this year either.  Anyway, she's saying, "yeah, we're definitely getting the seasonal flu vaccine.  H1N1 vaccine?  Um, well, I'm on the fence about that one.  I've read some reports about side effects, and heard that it isn't hypercontagious like they once thought it was.  Now I'm undecided about whether to get that one..."  That sort of thing.  She seemed rather well-informed for someone who was already having children in her 20s, I must admit.  You know, normally those interviewed say stuff like, "um, swine flew?  well, I'm a vegetarian anyway, so I'm not at risk.  Isn't it racist to mention swine flew anyway?"  But this chick actually came across as thoughtful and considerate and was deeply concerned with the advantages and disadvantages of vaccination.

Whatever.  I really don't think she is representative of the U.S. population.  I asked the woman who lives  behind me whether she was going to take her three daughters to get a flu vaccine.  One of their girls is my son's age and they play together so we talk sometimes.  She's a pharmacist and her husband is a dentist, so if I have a general drug question or a general mouth question I sometimes ask them.  She said oh, yeah, both the seasonal flu vaccine and the h1n1 vaccine.  No doubt.

About a week later I saw a different neighbor--the guy across the street--mowing his lawn.  He's an anasthesiologist.  Probably makes lots more money than I.  Has lots of big toys and leaves a mega-carbon footprint with his Hum-Vee and his gasoline-powered leaf blower and his gasoline-powered snow blower and his huge John Deere riding lawn mower which he uses to mow his standard suburban-size lawn.  (How ostentatious.)  Ah, but he's a nice guy.  Handsome too.  And well-cut.  He often mows with his shirt off.  Sculpted, he is.  Dark hair, dark eyes.  But I digress.  Anyway, his son is my son's age and they play sometimes.  So we talk.  I asked him whether he'd get his son to have a vaccine.  He's all like, um, whatever.  Yeah, I suppose.  Yeah, probably.

That was about a month ago.  When it was still warm and he was still out riding his John Deere shirtless.  I saw him again the day before yesterday and asked him whether he'd given his kid the shot yet.  "Um, not yet...

Anyway, I think most folks just don't place as much importance on that sort of thing as others do.

(Ask me about being quarantined in Tokyo back in May.  Bastards!)