Completely agree, "I truly cannot imagine how sick I’d be if I hadn’t gotten the flu shot." As I always say, "vaccines are like seat belts, while they many not prevent the crash (infection),they prevent serious harm and death."
With one remaining kidney (I said good-bye to the other one in 2000!), and in my eighth decade, I am SO grateful for the flu shot! People need to look more closely at the history (and current world-wide status) of health remedies and preventive measures. Do we really want to go backwards in time?
Would you play the lottery if you had a 30-40% chance of winning? So would I! The other counterfactual for vaccines is the side effects from getting them. I will take a sore arm for a 30% chance of winning the lottery!
I'm so sorry this hit you so hard and you did not need all those nasty comments from the vaccine deniers. I hope you are on the mend and I'll always be grateful for the help that you provided when I was riding my story about vaccines.
I’ve seen tamiflu prophylaxis work really well in households to prevent spread. As someone who also gets really sick, I’m so sorry you and your son got so sick.Thanks for sharing. Sorry that you were judged and criticized, especially when you were so sick. My state health department ( adjacent to your state), sends out an excellent respiratory disease information email and I noticed how much morbidity and mortality influenza has caused this season: twice as many deaths as COVID. After getting slammed by influenza A early, this influenza B wave is rough. Likely some waning immunity from the flu shot. Feel better soon.
Thank you for replying so calmly and kindly to vaccine skeptics. As a nurse who has cared for many flu patients I encourage everyone to discuss with their doctors. I will always get the flu vacine!
Back in 2019 the flu vaccine was not available yet for those under 65 when I had my doctor visit, as they were late getting it distributed. Unfortunately I then contracted the flu before I could get vaccinated. It was the sickest I had been that I could remember. A trip to the emergency room, prescription cough medicine that didn't work,and then a visit to my primary care doctor when I still hadn't improved after 10 days. It took a course of steroids and an inhaler and another week before I felt like a human being again. I have made sure that I always get my flu shot since then.
One thing the US does do well is vaccine availability and access (unless you're totally uninsured). Flu shots show up very early, vaccines are basically free if you have any kind of insurance (thanks Obama(care)!), there's little gatekeeping. It was weird to be in Canada (Quebec) and learn that flu shots were only available from November 1st, and that even Canadian adults on insurance would have to pay for them (depending on province). When I wanted an extra MMR dose, Walmart gave it and Medicaid paid for it, no questions asked. And US was an early adopter of chickenpox vaccine.
I almost always get my flu shot in October. For whatever reason, that year the vaccine specified for adults younger than 65 wasn't available yet. I ended up with the flu in early November. I hadn't had the flu in 25 years before that even before I started getting the flu vaccine regularly and haven't since. I will not miss another one. And yes, if insured there is no cost. And many health departments may provide them for free for uninsured patients.
My Dr had recommended a repeat of the pneumonia vaccine I got in '14 after a stay in the hospital. I'm over 60, and have COPD from repeated bouts of bronchitis. The vaccine was $327.00 . I had already applied Good RX. I had to skip it.
I have never had a flu shot, but this post is making me think I should.
I remember my dad getting very sick right after getting one, so I just avoided it. He never got another one, either.
Neither of us can actually prove our case because we only get one version of this story. We don’t know what would have happened to me in a world where I skipped the vaccine. Would I have ended up in the hospital? Would it have lasted longer? Would it somehow have been even worse? I genuinely don’t know. And neither does anyone else.
This is actually the whole reason we do research.
Anecdotes are meaningful. My experience this week was real, and it matters to me deeply as my lived experience. But a single story — mine, yours, anyone’s — is a data point. Not evidence. The plural of anecdote is not data, no matter how compelling the anecdote.”
After getting flu some 40 years ago and asking my husband to bring in our daughters so I could say goodbye (I was so sick I was convinced I was dying) I have gotten flu shots for years. And still don’t know if it makes a difference but I am unwilling to be the control for someone else to cough on me and find out.
Keep up the excellent sharings. I hope this never happens again to you (or anyone). Thank you for your candor and honesty.
My teenage son and I got flu B horribly as well. He came home sick from a school trip at the beginning of February (where almost every student and teacher got it as well). I caught it about 5 days later (I had foolishly thought I was in the clear after about day 2!), and it's the sickest I've ever been. I couldn't leave my couch for two weeks. He missed weeks of school and had to drop out of an extracurricular activity because of how behind he was. My son also got a horrible sinus infection, and I'm now dealing with lingering issues as well (more than a month lateR) and am seeing the doctor next week. I'll never say "just the flu" again. (And next time I will probably get an antiviral.)
More similarities to your experience: My husband never got sick even though we were all together. We also all got the flu shot.
If you have your own home HVAC and do not want whole family to catch airborne illness, use MERV 13 or better filter, if your HVAC can handle it. For my home, I have MERV 16 filter, fan running always, (not Auto mode that is often off), with UVC light shining on upstream surfaces to inactive pathogens that are captured and to prevent mold etc. We have 5" deep pleated Lennox filter to make less resistance to flow, with Carbon in filter exit that should also reduce ozone if present about 50% per pass. $100 filter lasts a year. We also have local HEPA filters, such as BlueAir Max that we turn on only if someone is ill, visiting or sneezing. Our home AQI is 0-1 ug/m3 for PM 2.5 um most of the time, as long as windows are closed, based on our www.PurpleAir.com PA-II particle counter. We also monitor CO2 in air from exhaled breath (CO2meter.com and also Aranet 4), and if [CO2] goes above 800 ppmv, we consider opening windows, if outside air AQI is tolerable. We only go outside with N95 mask if around people and rarely. Zero respiratory issues on our home of 3 for 6 years now, vs we used to often get 2 illnesses per year each before 2019 when both parents were still working. Now semiretired and advocating daily for better IAQ, diagnostics, healthcare and to Cure M.E., Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (http://SolveME.org) and Long Covid, that is similar. Sunday March 15th is Long Covid Awareness day, and Covid, an airborne illness, is still infecting millions, and leading to #MillionsMissing new cases or Long Covid and related ME/cfs that then results almost half the time, and can be lifelong. Be safe and be well and enjoy every day!
Thank you Mark for all of this information. If it was a "better" world...the different countries would still be taking Covid seriously...and there would be better ventilation in schools, hospitals, and just buildings to keep the people safer from viruses etc.. Better masks would have been created for the general public. PSAs would continue to alert people to wear masks, get their vaccines etc. when a surge starts for Covid, flu, RSV.....and somehow the public would have continued to be reminded of what it was like without vaccines. I still remember, as I am 70 now, how frightening polio was, of getting the TB test, of standing in a long lines with other students in the school gym waiting to get your shot...as we called it back then. Of my dad insisting that we go immediately to the doctor for me to get a tetanus shot because I had stepped on a rusty nail...because my Dad's little brother died of tetanus while they were on their farm because there wasn't a tetanus shot yet and Dad witnessed how brutal death was for his brother. Anyway. It is encouraging to see someone who has all of this knowledge that I don't have sharing with others. I will have to read your comments more than once to understand all, but will see what I can accomplish to better protect my family. Currently, we wear KN95 masks when there isn't a surge and going into buildings with others..except when going to doctor's office or hospitals..then N95 masks. We have greatly limited our social lives, to the point that we don't visit with most of our family members because they chose the other path which is heartbreaking. But, we are rarely ill...my husband and daughter caught Covid two years ago...husband giving it to my daughter as he gave her rides to school. He catching it from workers who came into his small office building although he had masked..realized that he probably caught it in the bathroom because it is so tiny. The doctor who treated my daughter for a severe case of flu type A about three weeks ago...told her that she definitely got it in the hospital where she was doing her clinicals because although she was wearing KN95 mask...that was fit tested and passed....most of the staff including nurses and doctors wore no masks or just surgical which we know don't work to protect against viruses...and of course neither did the patients. But, my son and myself have been very fortunate to have remained covid/flu free since the start of the pandemic. What a world we live in now.....
Lemme present Mark's ideas differently. For clean air you ideally want:
- PM2.5 of 0-1 mcg/m3, because particulates are bad for your lungs; the WHO's 'safe' threshold was lowered from 10 to 5 some years ago, EPA went from 12 to 9, you can see the trend. This is tangential to disease, but the filters that remove particulate pollution also remove infectious particles.
- CO2 as low as you can go, because it's a proxy for ventilation: high CO2 means you're re-breathing a lot of air that was recently in someone else's lungs, obviously a problem if someone else in the room or household is infectious.
Tools:
- CO2 meter, like the Aranet4. (You don't need specific brands, but I list what I have experience with.)
- PM2.5 meter, like the QingPing.
- Room Air Purifiers, like Levoit Core 300 or BlueAir 511. You don't need fancy options or electronics, just something with high CADR (clear air delivery rate) or CFM (cubic feet per minute) per $. 1.4 CFM / US$ is a good threshold; also, 0.7 CFM per square foot of room.
- HVAC with the fan continuously on, and filters of MERV13 or higher to remove disease or cooking particles as the air recycles; or HVAC with fan on and high outside intake, and an even better filter (to remove outside pollution in a single pass.
- possible ERV (energy recover ventilation) to allow outside air exchange without getting lots of heat or cold as well.
- Fit tested respirators as a last line of defense, or first line when going out into polluted air or crowded buildings.
The exact deployment of tools depends on your conditions. If you live where outside air is both moderate and clean, you can just open windows. If the air is clean but hot/cold, ERV is a good solution. If the outside air is polluted then you need home filters, room and/or HVAC. If you live alone then higher CO2 isn't that bad disease-wise (it's just your own air.)
Thank you so much Rafael. So kind of you to take time to explain this to me. I really appreciate it. You have helped to educate me so that I can protect my family better.
How horrible. Glad that you all are doing better. For what it's worth, I think people who don't have kids don't understand how hard it would be not to transmit disease through a household. I got covid (from a physician's assistant!), and masking protecred my son and husband from it. When my (masked) son brought it home from school, my husband got it quickly. Your methods, especially while sick, were awesome. And good information about Xofluza, which I always forget about (even though I hear about it constantly and could get it free).
I do disagree with this section, because none of these factors even added together play as big a role as viral load, and focusing on them lends credence to MAHA: "...his immune system has been sparring daily for years? The food we ate as kids? The fact that I am a workaholic for whom leaving the computer to check the mail counts as fresh air? That I don’t move my body as much as I know I should?."
There is some discussion about blood type antigens and severity of flu…. It has tracked we me. I am Type A + (vaccinated) and have never had a severe case of Type A flu. On the other hand, I have had Flu B twice and had experiences like you are describing here…. I thought I was not going to make it.
Completely agree, "I truly cannot imagine how sick I’d be if I hadn’t gotten the flu shot." As I always say, "vaccines are like seat belts, while they many not prevent the crash (infection),they prevent serious harm and death."
With one remaining kidney (I said good-bye to the other one in 2000!), and in my eighth decade, I am SO grateful for the flu shot! People need to look more closely at the history (and current world-wide status) of health remedies and preventive measures. Do we really want to go backwards in time?
"The vaccine didn't work"
Would you play the lottery if you had a 30-40% chance of winning? So would I! The other counterfactual for vaccines is the side effects from getting them. I will take a sore arm for a 30% chance of winning the lottery!
I'm so sorry this hit you so hard and you did not need all those nasty comments from the vaccine deniers. I hope you are on the mend and I'll always be grateful for the help that you provided when I was riding my story about vaccines.
I’ve seen tamiflu prophylaxis work really well in households to prevent spread. As someone who also gets really sick, I’m so sorry you and your son got so sick.Thanks for sharing. Sorry that you were judged and criticized, especially when you were so sick. My state health department ( adjacent to your state), sends out an excellent respiratory disease information email and I noticed how much morbidity and mortality influenza has caused this season: twice as many deaths as COVID. After getting slammed by influenza A early, this influenza B wave is rough. Likely some waning immunity from the flu shot. Feel better soon.
Thank you for replying so calmly and kindly to vaccine skeptics. As a nurse who has cared for many flu patients I encourage everyone to discuss with their doctors. I will always get the flu vacine!
Someday--maybe--I'll persuade at least a few antivaxxers that what you wrote so perfectly is true:
"Vaccines that are imperfect are not the same as vaccines that don’t work."
I've tried many times, but using more words. I plan to steal yours. <3
Back in 2019 the flu vaccine was not available yet for those under 65 when I had my doctor visit, as they were late getting it distributed. Unfortunately I then contracted the flu before I could get vaccinated. It was the sickest I had been that I could remember. A trip to the emergency room, prescription cough medicine that didn't work,and then a visit to my primary care doctor when I still hadn't improved after 10 days. It took a course of steroids and an inhaler and another week before I felt like a human being again. I have made sure that I always get my flu shot since then.
One thing the US does do well is vaccine availability and access (unless you're totally uninsured). Flu shots show up very early, vaccines are basically free if you have any kind of insurance (thanks Obama(care)!), there's little gatekeeping. It was weird to be in Canada (Quebec) and learn that flu shots were only available from November 1st, and that even Canadian adults on insurance would have to pay for them (depending on province). When I wanted an extra MMR dose, Walmart gave it and Medicaid paid for it, no questions asked. And US was an early adopter of chickenpox vaccine.
Pity more Americans don't make use of all this.
I almost always get my flu shot in October. For whatever reason, that year the vaccine specified for adults younger than 65 wasn't available yet. I ended up with the flu in early November. I hadn't had the flu in 25 years before that even before I started getting the flu vaccine regularly and haven't since. I will not miss another one. And yes, if insured there is no cost. And many health departments may provide them for free for uninsured patients.
I got MMR & TDAP in '24. Those were free to me.
My Dr had recommended a repeat of the pneumonia vaccine I got in '14 after a stay in the hospital. I'm over 60, and have COPD from repeated bouts of bronchitis. The vaccine was $327.00 . I had already applied Good RX. I had to skip it.
I have never had a flu shot, but this post is making me think I should.
I remember my dad getting very sick right after getting one, so I just avoided it. He never got another one, either.
> $327
Strange! I got the "over 50" pneumonia vaccine last fall -- free on Medicaid.
“Same information. Completely different instinct.
Neither of us can actually prove our case because we only get one version of this story. We don’t know what would have happened to me in a world where I skipped the vaccine. Would I have ended up in the hospital? Would it have lasted longer? Would it somehow have been even worse? I genuinely don’t know. And neither does anyone else.
This is actually the whole reason we do research.
Anecdotes are meaningful. My experience this week was real, and it matters to me deeply as my lived experience. But a single story — mine, yours, anyone’s — is a data point. Not evidence. The plural of anecdote is not data, no matter how compelling the anecdote.”
So great! I hope you finally kick all this soon!
After getting flu some 40 years ago and asking my husband to bring in our daughters so I could say goodbye (I was so sick I was convinced I was dying) I have gotten flu shots for years. And still don’t know if it makes a difference but I am unwilling to be the control for someone else to cough on me and find out.
Keep up the excellent sharings. I hope this never happens again to you (or anyone). Thank you for your candor and honesty.
So sorry you had to get this flu.
My teenage son and I got flu B horribly as well. He came home sick from a school trip at the beginning of February (where almost every student and teacher got it as well). I caught it about 5 days later (I had foolishly thought I was in the clear after about day 2!), and it's the sickest I've ever been. I couldn't leave my couch for two weeks. He missed weeks of school and had to drop out of an extracurricular activity because of how behind he was. My son also got a horrible sinus infection, and I'm now dealing with lingering issues as well (more than a month lateR) and am seeing the doctor next week. I'll never say "just the flu" again. (And next time I will probably get an antiviral.)
More similarities to your experience: My husband never got sick even though we were all together. We also all got the flu shot.
If you have your own home HVAC and do not want whole family to catch airborne illness, use MERV 13 or better filter, if your HVAC can handle it. For my home, I have MERV 16 filter, fan running always, (not Auto mode that is often off), with UVC light shining on upstream surfaces to inactive pathogens that are captured and to prevent mold etc. We have 5" deep pleated Lennox filter to make less resistance to flow, with Carbon in filter exit that should also reduce ozone if present about 50% per pass. $100 filter lasts a year. We also have local HEPA filters, such as BlueAir Max that we turn on only if someone is ill, visiting or sneezing. Our home AQI is 0-1 ug/m3 for PM 2.5 um most of the time, as long as windows are closed, based on our www.PurpleAir.com PA-II particle counter. We also monitor CO2 in air from exhaled breath (CO2meter.com and also Aranet 4), and if [CO2] goes above 800 ppmv, we consider opening windows, if outside air AQI is tolerable. We only go outside with N95 mask if around people and rarely. Zero respiratory issues on our home of 3 for 6 years now, vs we used to often get 2 illnesses per year each before 2019 when both parents were still working. Now semiretired and advocating daily for better IAQ, diagnostics, healthcare and to Cure M.E., Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (http://SolveME.org) and Long Covid, that is similar. Sunday March 15th is Long Covid Awareness day, and Covid, an airborne illness, is still infecting millions, and leading to #MillionsMissing new cases or Long Covid and related ME/cfs that then results almost half the time, and can be lifelong. Be safe and be well and enjoy every day!
Thank you Mark for all of this information. If it was a "better" world...the different countries would still be taking Covid seriously...and there would be better ventilation in schools, hospitals, and just buildings to keep the people safer from viruses etc.. Better masks would have been created for the general public. PSAs would continue to alert people to wear masks, get their vaccines etc. when a surge starts for Covid, flu, RSV.....and somehow the public would have continued to be reminded of what it was like without vaccines. I still remember, as I am 70 now, how frightening polio was, of getting the TB test, of standing in a long lines with other students in the school gym waiting to get your shot...as we called it back then. Of my dad insisting that we go immediately to the doctor for me to get a tetanus shot because I had stepped on a rusty nail...because my Dad's little brother died of tetanus while they were on their farm because there wasn't a tetanus shot yet and Dad witnessed how brutal death was for his brother. Anyway. It is encouraging to see someone who has all of this knowledge that I don't have sharing with others. I will have to read your comments more than once to understand all, but will see what I can accomplish to better protect my family. Currently, we wear KN95 masks when there isn't a surge and going into buildings with others..except when going to doctor's office or hospitals..then N95 masks. We have greatly limited our social lives, to the point that we don't visit with most of our family members because they chose the other path which is heartbreaking. But, we are rarely ill...my husband and daughter caught Covid two years ago...husband giving it to my daughter as he gave her rides to school. He catching it from workers who came into his small office building although he had masked..realized that he probably caught it in the bathroom because it is so tiny. The doctor who treated my daughter for a severe case of flu type A about three weeks ago...told her that she definitely got it in the hospital where she was doing her clinicals because although she was wearing KN95 mask...that was fit tested and passed....most of the staff including nurses and doctors wore no masks or just surgical which we know don't work to protect against viruses...and of course neither did the patients. But, my son and myself have been very fortunate to have remained covid/flu free since the start of the pandemic. What a world we live in now.....
Lemme present Mark's ideas differently. For clean air you ideally want:
- PM2.5 of 0-1 mcg/m3, because particulates are bad for your lungs; the WHO's 'safe' threshold was lowered from 10 to 5 some years ago, EPA went from 12 to 9, you can see the trend. This is tangential to disease, but the filters that remove particulate pollution also remove infectious particles.
- CO2 as low as you can go, because it's a proxy for ventilation: high CO2 means you're re-breathing a lot of air that was recently in someone else's lungs, obviously a problem if someone else in the room or household is infectious.
Tools:
- CO2 meter, like the Aranet4. (You don't need specific brands, but I list what I have experience with.)
- PM2.5 meter, like the QingPing.
- Room Air Purifiers, like Levoit Core 300 or BlueAir 511. You don't need fancy options or electronics, just something with high CADR (clear air delivery rate) or CFM (cubic feet per minute) per $. 1.4 CFM / US$ is a good threshold; also, 0.7 CFM per square foot of room.
- HVAC with the fan continuously on, and filters of MERV13 or higher to remove disease or cooking particles as the air recycles; or HVAC with fan on and high outside intake, and an even better filter (to remove outside pollution in a single pass.
- possible ERV (energy recover ventilation) to allow outside air exchange without getting lots of heat or cold as well.
- Fit tested respirators as a last line of defense, or first line when going out into polluted air or crowded buildings.
The exact deployment of tools depends on your conditions. If you live where outside air is both moderate and clean, you can just open windows. If the air is clean but hot/cold, ERV is a good solution. If the outside air is polluted then you need home filters, room and/or HVAC. If you live alone then higher CO2 isn't that bad disease-wise (it's just your own air.)
Thank you so much Rafael. So kind of you to take time to explain this to me. I really appreciate it. You have helped to educate me so that I can protect my family better.
Good points. Thank you for sharing and doing the work you do for public health. And I hope you all feel better soon.
Can’t believe you took the time to write! You go gal! Glad you seem to be slowly improving and kids are ok!
How horrible. Glad that you all are doing better. For what it's worth, I think people who don't have kids don't understand how hard it would be not to transmit disease through a household. I got covid (from a physician's assistant!), and masking protecred my son and husband from it. When my (masked) son brought it home from school, my husband got it quickly. Your methods, especially while sick, were awesome. And good information about Xofluza, which I always forget about (even though I hear about it constantly and could get it free).
I do disagree with this section, because none of these factors even added together play as big a role as viral load, and focusing on them lends credence to MAHA: "...his immune system has been sparring daily for years? The food we ate as kids? The fact that I am a workaholic for whom leaving the computer to check the mail counts as fresh air? That I don’t move my body as much as I know I should?."
There is some discussion about blood type antigens and severity of flu…. It has tracked we me. I am Type A + (vaccinated) and have never had a severe case of Type A flu. On the other hand, I have had Flu B twice and had experiences like you are describing here…. I thought I was not going to make it.
Any thoughts on this?