Allow me to narrate a hypothetical conversation which approximates those I have or overhear on a regular basis. Including a 4 day span last week, where this came up with almost everyone I talked to. Maybe you will find it helpful. (Or pedantic. But I'm going to do it anyway.)
"I don't get the flu shot. I get the flu when I get a flu shot."
Me: No you don't. The virus in the vaccine is dead. Dead, as in not biologically possible that it can give you flu. I promise.
"But I know, Carrie. The one time I got the flu shot, I got sick."
Me: Really? That one time? You know that lots of people are getting sick every day, right? So, when lots of people also get vaccinated there's bound to be some overlap, just by chance. How do you know you wouldn't have gotten sick anyway?
"Because I never get sick."
Me: Well, clearly you do sometimes get sick, you just told me about a time you got sick.
"But I just got the vaccine."
Me: Again, correlation is not the same as causation. Unless you could go back in time, not get the shot and see what would have happened otherwise.
Which is obviously not an option. This is why I have a job. We ask questions like that and try and find a way answer them (sans time machine). Instead, we find unexposed people who are as similar as possible to exposed people and compare what happens to them. Since people are getting sick all the time, I'm not really concerned that some sick people happen to have recently had a flu shot. I would, however, be concerned if vaccinated people were more likely to get sick than non-vaccinated people.
It's true that I can't know if you personally would have gotten sick that one time if you didn't get a flu shot. But, so far in the hundreds upon hundreds of studies involving millions of people and decades of flu shots, the answer is no, you are not more likely to get the flu after the flu shot. In fact, people are much less likely to get the flu if they get the flu shot. That's why we tell people to get their flu shot. Because it prevents flu.
If you don't think you need the flu shot, fine, that's your business. Although especially if my employer will give me a free chance not to get flu this winter, I don't know why I wouldn't take them up on it. But maybe that's just me.
Just don't tell me it gives you the flu. Because it doesn't.
:)
It's true that I can't know if you personally would have gotten sick that one time if you didn't get a flu shot. But, so far in the hundreds upon hundreds of studies involving millions of people and decades of flu shots, the answer is no, you are not more likely to get the flu after the flu shot. In fact, people are much less likely to get the flu if they get the flu shot. That's why we tell people to get their flu shot. Because it prevents flu.
If you don't think you need the flu shot, fine, that's your business. Although especially if my employer will give me a free chance not to get flu this winter, I don't know why I wouldn't take them up on it. But maybe that's just me.
Just don't tell me it gives you the flu. Because it doesn't.
:)
