Jason Alexander Says Getting a Flu Shot Is a 'No Brainer' Since His Mom Was a Nurse

Jason Alexander wants you to get your flu shot.

When Alexander, 62, was first approached to join a new campaign from the American Nurses Association (ANA) and pharmaceutical company Sanofi to encourage the public to get vaccinated against the flu this year, the Seinfeld alum told PEOPLE he had some questions.

"I, to this day, don't know what made the good people at Sanofi go 'Hey, flu vaccine, Jason Alexander.' I guess somehow I represent vaccinations," he joked.

He was happy to take part in, and star, in the brand-new campaign, Not Today, Flu.

"But, it was actually, this was a no brainer for me because it is something I believe in. It's something I do. I have been regularly getting vaccinated for flu for, I'm pretty sure, well over 20 years and I believe in it."

Alexander told PEOPLE that being raised by a nurse meant that throughout his life he has always looked to what the experts have to say when it comes to staying healthy.

"Because I grew up with a mom who was very much a frontline health care worker, I tend to listen to the advice of people who are smarter than me," he said.  "So I tend to follow the precautions that are recommended."

Courtesy of Sanofi/ANA Jason Alexander

He said growing up with his mother also meant that despite his best efforts, he doesn't remember ever missing a day of school because of illness.

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"I could not fool this woman. I couldn't," he remembered. "No matter what I did, I would get up in the middle of the night I'd open a can of cream of mushroom soup, pour it in the toilet, go 'Mom, I threw up' — nothing. She didn't buy that. I would rest the thermometer on the radiator to get the numbers. She didn't buy that. Nothing. My mom was a big proponent of 'get dressed, go to school, you'll take two aspirin.' "

As a working actor both on screen and stage for over four decades, Alexander recalled a time earlier in his career when getting sick hampered his ability to work.

He said it happened during one of his Broadway gigs when he was performing in Jerome Robbins' Broadway and he experienced "a flu basically" that then turned into bronchitis. As it was the Tony Awards voting season, producers were eager to get him back on stage.

"So I went back and performed with bronchitis and I will tell you it is no treat to either me or the audience that had to endure me doing them."

During his tenure on Seinfeld, Alexander said the only person he remembered ever getting "a flu-ish kind of thing" was Jerry Seinfeld himself.

Courtesy of Sanofi/ANA Jason Alexander

"I would always marvel at Jerry's ability to kind of just persevere through it," Alexander said of his long-time co-star. "He would show up, he had every symptom in the book, I'd want to go crawling back to my mother for chicken soup ... and he just toughed it out. So, he's a stronger man than I."

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Alexander said that when he signed on to be the face of the new campaign he thought it had a "wonderful sense of humor about it."

In the video, which was released Wednesday, the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel actor is seen playing "a guardian angel figure," as he described, who prevents " little terrible things from happening to people."

He tells viewers that getting a flu shot can protect against complications from the flu such as pneumonia, heart attack or stroke.

"It's an easy thing to do," he told PEOPLE about getting the flu shot.  "It's an important thing to do. And when they asked me I just went 'I would be delighted to be a part of that message.' "