I went to get my free flu shot at work today, and found out chicken eggs were involved in the process (I had to answer whether or not I was allergic to eggs before receiving the shot).
I asked if they had any alternatives, and they said they didn't because they were too expensive. I ended up getting the flu shot they offered.
Do you get the standard flu shot, or a vegan variant? How much do you pay, if the latter, and where can you find it?
Edit 1 year later: I took FluBlok this time around, which doesn't use eggs. Offered at my local supermarket pharmacy and quite a few other places nearby.
There appear to be alternatives, but they use cultured mammalian cells or insect cells instead, and while they say no animals are harmed in the process I guess that's not technically vegan.
If you're interested in a non vegan opinion on the matter overall:
spoiler
using an egg-related product once a year to prevent illness doesn't seem so bad to me. you probably already eat "about one to two pounds of flies, maggots and other bugs each year without even knowing it" according to this food anthropologist lady
Thank you for the link. The mammalian cell option seems like a good one, since it seems like no creatures are harmed to gather the cells. Or, at least, any harm is abstracted to an additional level.
I would say though, taking the vaccine is an active choice that I can weigh my options on, while unknowingly/mistakenly consuming insects is not. The latter is regrettable but unavoidable, so I wouldn't blame myself for that. To the best of my ability I want to avoid contributing to animal suffering, so part of living up to the "best of my ability" part is looking into alternatives in the one-off cases like this one.
Appreciate your input, thanks again