Soundtrack: Joe Jackson, “The Verdict”

I got a flu shot in mid-October. It wasn’t the first one I’d ever gotten. While in previous years I’d seen no need to get one, I got them in the fall of 2005 and 2006 because my mother was dealing with cancer and chemotherapy. All three times it was through the same program at work.

Despite the flu shot, I had to take some fairly extreme avoidance measures last Christmas to keep my mother from getting sick because I ended up catching pneumonia. It seems that the bout of pneumonia has made me more susceptible to colds and potential future bouts of pneumonia, so, for that reason, I decided to get a flu shot again this year. I had no reaction the first two years I got the shot, but this year was different.

I felt slightly woozy almost immediately, and it slowly increased through the afternoon. Gradually, I became aware ofactually feeling a little dizzy. I never feel dizzy. It got to the point where I found myself unable to concentrate at work, and so I reported it to my supervisor, and took sick time for the remainder of the afternoon. I called the on-call nurse at Dean Clinic, but she didn’t seem too concerned, and she also said that my symptoms didn’t match the classic flu shot reaction symptoms.

I felt fine the next morning, but later on in the day, I began to feel like I was catching a cold. I ended up coming down with a minor cold over the next few days, and then it faded once again.

Several co-workers reported feeling woozy, though not dizzy like myself, and I think one other person had cold symptoms not unlike mine. I sort of found it strange.

But I didn’t think about it more until a housemate came down with a nasty cold last week. She said that it happened right after she got the flu shot. She was very sick, with constant coughing and high fever. One week later, she still hasn’t shaken the cough. Her room is next to mine and I can hear her coughing at night. She got the shot because a family whom she does childcare for is about to have a baby.

So I decided to look online and see what I could find out. Nothing conclusive. The overwhelming majority of the websites I see say “Get it!” A couple also question it or raise serious issues with it.   , so I'm not quite sure what to think.

At the same time, flu does kil.  I'm really not sure what to think. The reaction is certainly not as bad as the flu itself. I do wonder about the long-term effects of the shot. I must also say that I’ve had more issues with asthma and lung infections since I started getting the flu shot two years ago. Maybe the shots have nothing to do with it. But associating the flu shot with my increased susceptibility to colds is no less scientific that associating a lot of diseases with obesity--something which seems to be happening in our media more and more.