I typically visit a doctor (for medical reasons) ...

You seem very proud of the fact that you do not get an annual flu shot or other vaccinations. You have already received at least one hostile comment because of this fact, and I must admit that my first impulse was to say something similarly vague, cryptic, and hostile. However, I realized that you might not be an asshole, but simply ignorant. On the off chance that you are actually concerned with people beyond yourself: vaccinations are important, even for people who feel that they never get sick.

Vaccination does two things: first, it keeps the individuals who have been vaccinated from getting sick; and second, it reduces the number of viable hosts, thus preventing diseases from spreading through society. Now, you might be willing to risk getting sick yourself, so the first may not matter to you, but the second should. Society benefits when people are not sickened and killed by preventable diseases. And make no mistake: influenza, pertussis, measles, chicken pox, and many of the other diseases for which we have vaccines can cause permanent damage or death.

There are people who cannot be vaccinated (the very young, people who are immunocompromised, and so on) and vaccines are not 100% effective, so some number of those that have been vaccinated are still vulnerable. The way to keep these people healthy is to ensure that the possible exposure to disease is limited as much as possible, which means relying on herd immunity. Herd immunity comes from vaccinating as many people as possible.

So please, if not for you, for the sake of the people around you, get vaccinated.

Because if you can't believe a disgraced doctor who falsified his case studies, who can you trust?

I only believe research verified by former Playboy Playmates.

The single dose flu vaccines, which is all the nasal type, do not contain thermisol/mercury.

That's true, mostly because the anti-vaccine movement keeps flogging that old dead horse that thiomersal (or thimerosal in the US), the anti-fungal agent containing mercury II used in some formulations of the flu vaccine, is toxic or causes autism. It's not actually a reason to not get vaccinated, because vaccination doesn't cause autism and getting a microscopic dose of a mercury-based compound once a year is not going to do you any meaningful harm. On the other hand, people who refuse to get vaccinated and pass on the flu to their elderly neighbours kill thousands of people every year.

From the CDC:

Is thimerosal in vaccines safe?

Yes. There is a large body of scientific evidence on the safety of thimerosal. Data from several studies show the low doses of thimerosal in vaccines do not cause harm, and are only associated with minor local injection site reactions like redness and swelling at the injection site.

Three U.S. health agencies (The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH)) have reviewed the published research on thimerosal and found it to be a safe product to use in vaccines. Three independent organizations [The National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine, Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP)] reviewed the published research and also found thimerosal to be a safe product to use in vaccines. The medical community supports the use of thimerosal in influenza vaccines to protect against potential bacterial contamination of multi-dose vials.

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/vaccine/thimerosal.htm [cdc.gov]

FFS, send her to an ID specialist to get a proper opinion, or at least forward her this one. [medscape.com]

I've included the relevant responses to the objections that you make:

1) The flu shot gives me the flu. Dumb Ass. The shot is a killed vaccine. It cannot give you influenza. It is impossible to get flu from the influenza vaccine, either from the shot or the live attenuated vaccine..

10) I received the vaccine and I got the flu anyway. Inexact Dumb Ass. The vaccine is not perfect and you may have indeed had the flu. More likely you called one of the many respiratory viruses (viri?) people get each year that they call ‘the flu’. Remember there are dozens of potential causes of a respiratory infection circulating, the vaccine only covers influenza, the virus most likely to kill you and yours.

13) The flu vaccine is not safe and has not been evaluated for safety. Computer illiterate Dumb Ass. There are 1812 references on the PubMeds on safety of the flu vaccine as I write this and the vaccine usually causes at most only short term, mild reactions. All health care requires weighing the risks of an intervention against the benefits. For the flu vaccine all the data suggests huge benefit for negligible risk. And as a HCW, it could be argued that we have a moral responsibility to maximize the safety of our patients.

3) Only old people get the flu. Selfish Dumb Ass. Influenza can infect anyone, and the groups who are more likely to die of influenza are the very young, the pregnant, and the elderly. Often those most at risk for dying from influenza are those least able, due to age or underlying diseases, to respond to the vaccine. Like your patients. You can help prevent your old, sickly Grandmother or your newborn daughter from getting influenza by getting the vaccine, so you do not get flu and pass it one to her. Influenza, by the way, is highly contagious, with 20% to 50% of contacts with an index case getting the flu. However, Granny may be sitting on a fortune that will come to you, and killing her off with influenza is a great way to get her out of the way and never be caught. That would make a good episode of CSI.

10) I received the vaccine and I got the flu anyway [medscape.com]. Inexact Dumb Ass. The vaccine is not perfect and you may have indeed had the flu. More likely you called one of the many respiratory viruses (viri?) people get each year that they call ‘the flu’. Remember there are dozens of potential causes of a respiratory infection circulating, the vaccine only covers influenza, the virus most likely to kill you and yours.

7) The vaccine is worse than the disease. [medscape.com] Dumb Ass AND a wimp. What a combination. Your mother must be proud. Unless you think a sore deltoid for a day is too high a price to pay to prevent two weeks of high fevers, severe muscles aches, and intractable [...]

2) I never get the flu, so I don’t need the vaccine. [medscape.com] Irresponsible Dumb Ass. I have never had a head on collision, but I wear my seat belt. And you probably don’t use a condom either. So far you have been lucky, and you are a potential winner of a Darwin Award, although since you don’t use a condom, you are unfortunately still in the gene pool. [...] Nice going.