A Simple Shot of Protection

Twelve-year-old Tyler Newville’s room is a quiet place.

For the past two years the purple and gold colored walls have been a memorial, a sacred spot for his parents, Tim and Renee to come to pray, think and remember. As they sit in the downstairs bedroom that their Minnesota Vikings fan son loved, they look at pictures of the boy with a bright smile and kind eyes.

“I never want to take any of those special moments we had with him for granted,” says his mother Renee, resting on the end of the bed. “We miss him so terribly. We miss him every day.”

Two years ago, the fun-loving but sensitive middle schooler who dreamed of a career in sports broadcasting, died very suddenly from complications of the H1N1 influenza virus. Tyler, an only child who had rarely even gotten colds in the past, was so healthy that his parents never expected that he would catch the flu.

“He was the last person you’d expect to get sick,” Tim said, unrolling posters signed by the boy’s classmates. “Just the year before he’d gotten an award for his attendance at school.“

Waiting for vaccine

Tyler caught the flu in the end of November 2009, during a time when H1N1 was circulating. While the family had always been good about getting seasonal flu shots in the past, they were unable to get him an H1N1 shot that month because the lines were just too long.

Renee had taken Tyler to one of the H1N1 shot clinics held in the Sioux Falls Convention Center. As thousands of parents and children stood in long twisting lines to queue up for the vaccinations, Tyler and Renee were toward the back and had no guarantee that they would even get one of the shots, she said.

“I had a 12-year-old tugging at my shoulder, saying, ‘Oh, Mom, lets just wait for the next one,’” Renee says, sitting on his bed. “I figured we’d save the shots for those kids who really needed them that day and bring him back later.”

Just about a week later, on a Wednesday night, he seemed to have come down with the sniffles and felt a little “punky,” his parents said. They kept him home the next day from school and monitored his fever, which seemed to break overnight. While he didn’t feel great, he even got up and ate dinner of chicken nuggets with Tim before going back to bed.

“We thought it was just a little fever,” Tim says. “You figure he’s healthy, he’ll bounce back like he always does.”

A serious illness

By Friday morning, Renee took Tyler to the doctor because he seemed to be getting worse. His hands and feel were cold and he started having serious trouble breathing.

His doctor immediately rushed the boy to Sanford Children’s Hospital, diagnosing him with viral pneumonia. As doctors rushed to help Tyler, his lungs were filling up with fluid and his body went into severe shock.

“One day you’re at home with a little fever, the next you’re in the hospital and they’re talking about taking your son in an airplane for an experimental treatment that might save his life,” his mother said. “It all just happened so fast.”

At around 6:30 p.m. on November 20, 2009, Tyler died.

Tyler died of overwhelming viral (H1N1) pneumonia, says Dr. Wendell Hoffman, a Sanford infectious disease specialist. It’s not exactly clear why Tyler’s body reacted to the virus in this way.

While many people only worry about the threat of influenza to those with chronic disease, it can sometimes lead to catastrophic results in those who are otherwise healthy. Young robust immune systems can sometimes respond to influenza viruses which such vigor that the immune response itself leads to collapse of the lungs and death.

“We can be very proud of Dr. Joe Segeleon, a pediatric intensive care doctor and the pediatric intensive care unit nursing staff,” Hoffman said. “They went to extraordinary efforts to save this boy’s life.”

While it is difficult to say if an influenza vaccine would have made the difference for Tyler, many studies have shown that people who are exposed to influenza after getting vaccinated are either fully protected or get a milder version of the illness. While there is a clear need for more effective influenza vaccines, the current form of the vaccine still represents the single most important measure that the public can take to prevent the complications of influenza, Hoffman said.

A service to community

And more importantly yet, if enough people get vaccinated for the seasonal flu, the disease simply doesn’t spread as readily, Hoffman said. The influenza virus is primarily transmitted through respiratory droplets that spread out to three to six feet around us and infected people can shed virus without even knowing.

When otherwise healthy people take action to avoid getting the flu, they’re avoiding spreading it to people they interact with in their home, workplace, church or anywhere else, the doctor said. Vaccination for the flu has the same effect as the aggressive vaccine strategies engages in the United States for diseases like measles, mumps, rubella, whooping cough, diphtheria, chicken pox, tetanus, meningitis and polio.

“It’s something you do for your own good, but also for the good of others,” Hoffman said. “All of these diseases have become largely a thing of the past because someone got vaccinated, in part to protect themselves, but also to protect the whole. The same principle applies to influenza.”

Although it’s painful for Tyler’s parents to think about the son they’ve lost, they say they want other families to understand how important it is to get vaccinated for the flu every year. No one should have to go through losing their child to a virus that could so easily be prevented, they say.

“Even today it’s like someone has pulled the heart out of your chest,” the father says. “I should be talking with him about buying his first car, not talking about his funeral.”

Every morning Renee is reminded of how her son used to climb into bed and cuddle with her. She misses him every day, but wants to make sure other people understand why they need to take those few moments and get a flu shot.

“This is not something to brush off,” Renee said. “The reality is that there is something you can do. Get vaccinated and get your children vaccinated.”