Help, I’ve Been Shot

This is the year of the flu shot tease. First everyone was hyped to the danger of flu… how it was imperative that those at risk (now featuring me) take a shot. Then… oops… we won’t have enough.

The cause was contamination, though the type of contamination was never specified. Did they cook this stuff up in a bathtub? Were open vials of vaccine stored in someone’s car? No one’s telling me.

All of a sudden I went from a prime candidate to an unnecessary burden on the overtaxed system. There would be no flu shot for me.

On the news, we did a number of stories showing seniors (a group I’m getting much too close to) waiting in line, outside, to get a shot. It was despicable. This was an insult to those seniors, making them queue up and wait. Even then, often the shots ran out before the line was through.

This was really no better than having them beg for medicine. Even with a paucity of serum, the distribution was so poorly organized that a bad situation became worse.

There still aren’t enough shots to go around, but the real panic has eased.

Recently my physician let me know he had two shots left. In many ways our email conversation resembled someone with hard to get tickets to the Super Bowl or a hot concert. I was quiet about it, lest I set off some flu vaccine frenzy.

I wasn’t taking vaccine that was otherwise needed. He couldn’t send them to a health agency, because they didn’t take ‘sing;es’. He had serviced all his high risk patients. Helaine and I could be his last inoculations for this season.

Today we went and got them.

I think it’s well established that I am a wuss as far as needles are concerned. This was relatively painless. Compared to the blood I often have drawn for cholesterol tests and the like, this was over in an instant. And now Helaine and I are safe from flu.

This pretty much guarantees the shot was unnecessary, right?

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