32-year-old Laura Spacagna had never considered the flu shot very seriously. She’d gotten it when she’d been pregnant with her daughter, but since then, it wasn’t something that occurred to her as a medical necessity.
When she fell ill with a sore throat and cough, symptoms of the flu, she let them linger before she even bothered contacting her doctor. It was only two days later that she went in to see her doctor for medication.
But less than 24 hours later, Spacagna was having trouble breathing to the point that her lips and fingers were turning blue.
Her family rushed her off to the hospital, where doctors diagnosed her with double pneumonia, infections in both her lungs; oxygen loss; and organ failure.
At the hospital, Spacagna was already falling in and out of consciousness, so her doctors decided to place her into an induced coma for two weeks to help her body fully recover.
Spacagna only woke up when her doctors woke her. It was Christmas then, and Spacagna remembered feeling completely disoriented, not remembering why she had been in the hospital in the first place – nor why she was in the hospital on Christmas Day.
It has taken her considerable time and effort to recover the muscles in her body and become well enough to return home with her daughter.
Although Spacagna is in good health once more, the repercussions of her illness remain present in her life, even now, two years later.
Her young daughter has strong memories of her mother’s time in the hospital, and now, every time Spacagna gets ill – even with a “small cold” – she “remembers” and worries about her mother’s health.
It’s these factors that now encourage Spacagna to speak out about flu vaccines and protecting ourselves – and others – from the flu.
“Everyone who is offered it should get the jab. If not to prevent yourself from getting the flu, to prevent spreading it to your loved ones or anyone in our care at the hospital - remember that the flu vaccine can save a life,” she said.
“I want to raise awareness to everyone to say that if you are offered the flu vaccine please take it because it doesn’t matter what age you are or how fit and healthy you think you are.”
