Can You Get the Flu Shot If You Have an Egg Allergy? (Yes — Here’s Why the Myth Is Wrong)

Welcome Everyone

Welcome everyone today. I’m excited for this. Uh, next episode. I’m Dr. Doug Jones, board certified allergist and immunologist, and today’s special guest joined by my lovely wife.

Do you wanna introduce yourself? That’s me. That’s you? Yes. I am Dr. Tricia twelves, board certified obstetrician and gynecologist. So you can see we come from very different worlds, but kind of I’m glad you’re here. Thank you. I’m glad I’m here too. Yeah. Okay. I have, uh, I have a question for you. So in my office, I, it’s flu season and I have a lot of patients that are wanting to get their flu shot and they’re pregnant.

And they’re concerned about egg allergies. Okay, so what advice do you have for me to give those patients?

Debunking the Egg Allergy Myth

So this question comes up every single year, and this myth has been just debunked probably longer than, you know. RFK has been spewing pseudoscience. I mean, this is, was disproven years and years and years ago that egg allergy does not pose risk for, uh.

Or those that have egg allergy are not at risk if they’re getting a flu vaccine. So what I would say is if it’s indicated, go ahead and get the flu vaccine. Um, even if you have egg allergy, that should just be off. Any kind of questions, any kind of information sheets, uh, US allergists talk about this every single year, and we’ve done so for.

Probably a decade and a half, maybe two decades. So, uh, a lot of actual science to back that up.

Where Did the Concern Come From?

Was there ever any data or where, where was the concern for this in the beginning? There, there was like years and years ago, uh, kind of that concern because we found that. Getting a page. Yeah. This is what happens when you’re married to an ob.

GYN is sometimes they just get paged and you know, you need to take care of your patients. Right. I actually am going to go do a delivery. Okay. But you are so cute, so keep doing what you’re doing. All right. I’m gonna keep, uh, answering the question. Okay. What was the question? Oh, the, kind of the history of the flu vaccine.

Why People Once Thought Egg Allergy Was a Problem

Um, so what we have is, years ago, people who had egg allergy would maybe develop a reaction or something to the flu vaccine, and so they attributed it to the egg allergy.

But really what we’ve found in years of study is that. Those that are reacting to the vaccine or have perhaps an adverse reaction to it, the egg allergic population, the rates of those reactions aren’t any different than the general population.

So again, that’s just been debunked because vaccines, while they’re a tremendous help and a tremendous. Blessing to the world. Uh, they do carry some adverse reactions that we have to be mindful of and note, and, um, you know, in some cases, uh, we, we’ve really gotta pay attention to those things. It doesn’t mean that you’d necessarily have to avoid vaccines or go to an extreme of becoming an anti-vaxxer.

What We Do Need: Good Information, Not Old Myths

It’s just we need to understand and be well-informed. Of certain risks associated with vaccines, um, and what populations may be at risk versus those that aren’t. And, but in this case, this issue comes up every year of, you know, what happens if you have a flu vaccine or need a flu vaccine and or egg allergic.

The Immune Edit for This Week

So that’s gonna be the immune edit for this week is. If you’re inclined to get a flu vaccine and you have egg allergy, go ahead and get it.

The edit that I would really love to see made is this issue. Just be put to rest. Because it has been proven and proven and proven time and time again. And what we’d like to do is rather focus our energies onto things that we don’t know.

But this is one that we definitely do know. So thank you for tuning in on this episode. Until next time, uh, I’m Dr. Doug Jones and, uh, we look forward to you listening in and chiming in next time.

‍