Are there any contradictions between taking flu vaccine and antibiotic at the same time?

Answer 1

Nina,

Not really a "contradiction." It may not be necessary or helpful to do both, however, because antibiotics and most vaccines do very different jobs.

Normally (there are exceptions--more on that in a minute) a vaccine is targeted aganst a virus. Unhappily, antibiotics do not attack viruses, so most often the vaccine's "arming" your body's defenses against the virus is the only way we have of killing it.

Once in a while, your immune system can be so depleted fighting the virus that it allows a bacterial infection to begin. That's when an antibiotic is useful, against what is called an "Opportunistic infection" by a bacteria.

There is one case, however, when a vaccine and an antibiotic can be used together, and that is when the infection is bacterial, and the vaccine that you were given is against that bacteria. There are quite a few vaccines against bacteria (such as against the bubonic plague), and while we normally don't need to use both a vaccine adn an antibiotic, both can be used simultaneously to attack that bacteria if the infection is particularly virulent.

Answer 2

Yes you should not get the flu vaccine if you are antibiotics for an infection or if you are sick or have a cold.