H1N1 crunch time

Ottawa Public Health will be opening its H1N1 flu vaccination clinics on Monday. For the first seven to 14 days, Ottawa residents who meet certain criteria -- young children, pregnant women and health care workers -- will be able to receive the flu shot.

For the most part, I've been able to tune out most of the media reports in regards to H1N1. Sometimes ignorance can be bliss. But it hasn't been easy as the swine flu leads most newscasts. If Max Keeping and Carol Ann Meehan aren't talking about it at 6 p.m., then you can usually hear about it from Peter Mansbridge at 10 p.m. And if you want a double dose of H1N1 news, you can always tune in for Lloyd Robertson's newcast at 11 p.m.

Yeah, I think we are all H1N1-out.

Even though I have been able to tune most of the news out, there is no tuning out the fact that the flu season has arrived. For the last two years I haven't giving the flu much thought. For the most part I do get the seasonal flu vaccine, but I haven't received a flu shot in the last two years. And like most Canadians, I'm a little leery of rolling up my sleeve and getting a shot of vaccine that I feel hasn't been adequately tested enough. But at the same time, I don't want to fall ill from H1N1. It is a classic catch-22.

While I've got some time to give the subject some thought before deciding if I should roll up my sleeve, dear husband and I are still on the fence about darling daughter get the H1N1 vaccination. It is such a tough call. Right at this moment, I'm not too sure what I'm going to do. I guess all I can do is do some research and come up with a decision that I can live with.