What Parents Should Know About Swine Flu Shots By Nancy Shute
The questions I asked at my daughter's well-child doctor visit
this week were not happy ones: They were all about what to do if
the swine flu pandemic gets much worse this fall and she becomes
sick. I asked for a prescription for pediatric Tamiflu. Not
going to do it, the nurse practitioner said. She told me to be
alert for a sudden fever and cough and to come in for a rapid
Type-A flu test if symptoms occur. If the test is positive, my
daughter will be put on an antiviral drug such as Tamiflu. I
left the pediatrician's office just as worried. A neighborhood
mom who is an intensive-care nurse had just told me that day
that she's been caring for a previously healthy 24-year-old who
has spent the past month on a ventilator after coming down with
swine flu. While most children and young adults have been
recovering quickly, every parent's nightmare is that his or her
child will be the one who becomes deathly ill. Watchful waiting
doesn't offer much rea