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Your situation with your daughter certainly complicates matters for you. I would get the smallpox vaccine TODAY if I could, and give it to my kids (teenagers and older). Of course, I would listen to what my doctor had to say about the vaccination and read up on it in the PDR and other sources. But being healthy, I can't imagine anything that we could learn that would cause me any hesitation in getting us all vaccinated.

After all, we vaccinated EVERYONE (with few exceptions for very specific reasons) for years and years. Of all the people I knew (10,000, 20,000, 50,000???), I never knew or even heard of anyone having an adverse reaction. If it was considered generally safe then, why would that analysis be any different now? Especially when the risk of the disease is so much greater?

If I were you, in order to protect my child if for no other reason, I would agitate for the right of people like me to get vaccinated ASAP. A non-immunized person receives great benefit from the fact that they are surrounded by immunized people. It makes it much less likely that they will come in contact with the infection.

This decision is really a personal one and should be left up to the individual or his parents. The government, the CDC, and the medical community can certainly make recommendations, but IT'S MY CHOICE, not theirs, just like it's your choice about your daughter.