- CDC Urges Americans To Stay Up-To-Date On Measles Vaccinations Citing Rise In Cases HuffPost
- Health Alert Network (HAN) – 00504 | Increase in Global and Domestic Measles Cases and Outbreaks: Ensure Children in the United States and Those Traveling Internationally 6 Months and Older are Current on MMR Vaccination CDC Emergency Preparedness
- CDC issues measles alert as 2024 cases have already equaled all of 2023 Fox News
- CDC urges vaccination amid rise in measles cases in the US and globally CNN
- CDC measles alert urges MMR vaccine for youngest international travelers University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Tag Archives: Vaccinations
250,000 kindergartners are vulnerable due to drop in vaccination rate
Nearly a quarter of a million kindergartners are vulnerable to measles due to a dip in vaccination coverage during the pandemic, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC, in a report published Thursday, found that 93% of kindergartners were up to date with state-required vaccines during the 2021-22 school year, a decline of 2% from 2019-20.
“While this might not sound significant, it means nearly 250,000 kindergartners are potentially not protected against measles,” Dr. Georgina Peacock, head of the CDC’s immunization services division, said during a call with reporters Thursday.
“And we know that measles, mumps and rubella vaccination coverage for kindergartners is the lowest it has been in over a decade,” Peacock said.
Kindergartners are required to be vaccinated against measles, mumps and rubella; chickenpox; polio; and diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis. The vaccination rate for measles, mumps and rubella was 93.5% during the 2021-22 school year, below the target coverage of 95% to prevent outbreaks.
An ongoing measles outbreak in Columbus, Ohio, has spread to 83 children, 33 of whom were hospitalized. None of the children have died. The overwhelming majority of the kids, 78, were not vaccinated.
“These outbreaks harm children and cause significant disruptions in their opportunities to learn and grow and thrive,” said Dr. Sean O’Leary, who heads the American Academy of Pediatrics committee on infectious disease. “This is alarming and it should be a call to action for all of us.”
The CDC report looked at whether the kindergartners had received the second dose of their measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. Two doses are 97% effective at preventing disease and one dose is about 93% effective, according to the CDC.
Measles is a highly contagious virus that spreads when someone coughs or sneezes and contaminates the air, where the virus can linger for up to two hours. It can also spread when a person touches a contaminated surface and then touches their eyes, nose or mouth.
The virus is so contagious that a single person can spread the virus to 90% of people close to them who do not have immunity through vaccination or a previous infection, according to the CDC.
Measles can be dangerous for children younger than 5, adults older than 20, pregnant women, and people with compromised immune systems.
About 1 in 5 unvaccinated people who catch it are hospitalized. About 1 in 20 kids get pneumonia, and one in 1,000 have brain swelling that can cause disabilities. Symptoms begin with a high fever, cough, runny nose and red eyes. White spots appear in the mouth two to three days later, and a rash breaks out on the body.
CDC officials said disruptions to schools and the health-care system during the Covid pandemic are largely responsible for the decline in vaccination rates.
“We know that the pandemic really had a disruption to health-care systems,” Peacock said. “Part of it is that well-child visits maybe were missed and people are still trying to catch up on those well-child visits.”
“We know that the schools had a lot of things to focus on and in some cases maybe they were not able to gather all that documentation on the vaccinations,” Peacock said. “Or because children were at home for a lot of the pandemic, that may have not been the emphasis while they were focused on testing and doing all those other things related to the pandemic.”
In a separate report published Thursday, the CDC found that coverage for what’s known as the combined seven-vaccine series actually increased slightly among children born in 2018-19 by the time they turned two, compared with kids born in 2016-17.
This seven-vaccine series includes shots against measles, chickenpox, polio, hepatitis B, streptococcus pneumoniae, haemophilus influenzae or Hib, and diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis.
However, the CDC found that there were major income and racial disparities. Vaccination coverage declined by up to 5% during the pandemic for those living below the poverty level or in rural areas. Black and Hispanic children had lower vaccination rates than white children.
O’Leary said that while misinformation about vaccines is a problem, the vast majority of parents are still getting their kids vaccinated. He said inequality is the bigger issue.
“The things we really need to focus on are addressing access and child poverty,” O’Leary said.
More than 80 Ohio children infected in measles outbreak, most unvaccinated
More than 80 children have been infected with measles in central Ohio as an outbreak in the state continues to spread rapidly among the unvaccinated population.
The measles virus is primarily spreading around the city of Columbus and has infected at least 81 children so far, hospitalizing 29 of them, officials reported last week.
Health authorities have not reported any deaths associated with the outbreak, which began in November and started growing earlier this month into a major public health scare.
The outbreak appears to be spreading primarily among the unvaccinated. Seventy-six of the confirmed infections in Columbus were among unvaccinated children.
Physicians and local health officials have warned that misinformation and vaccine hesitancy, both of which intensified during the pandemic, have worsened the measles outbreak.
Columbus Health Commissioner Mysheika Roberts said in an interview this month the outbreak began when a small number of individuals returned from a measles-endemic area and came to the city, where the virus easily spread among unvaccinated children.
“The reason why so many of our young children have been impacted by this measles outbreak is because that’s the greatest majority of our population that’s unvaccinated,” she said.
More than two-thirds of the cases confirmed so far are among children aged 1 year old to 5 years old.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends the first dose of a measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine for children aged 14 months to 15 months and a second dose at age 4 to age 6.
Measles is a disease caused by a highly contagious, airborne virus.
Utah doctors keep encouraging vaccinations as hospitals fill due to respiratory illnesses
Intermountain doctors are again urging Utahns to get flu and COVID-19 vaccinations as hospitals are at or near capacity dealing with high levels of respiratory illnesses. (Kristin Murphy, Deseret News)
Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes
SALT LAKE CITY — Doctors are again urging Utahns to get flu and COVID-19 vaccinations as hospitals are at or near capacity dealing with high levels of respiratory illnesses.
Dr. Per Gesteland, pediatric hospitalist at Primary Children’s Hospital and University of Utah Health, said that in the last few weeks, communities in Utah have been hit hard with RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) and influenza and, to a lesser extent, other illnesses like COVID-19, seasonal coronavirus and strep throat.
“The surge has been so large that it has been placing a great deal of strain on our health care delivery system,” he said.
Gesteland said this is even more severe at children’s facilities, including at Primary Children’s Hospital, which has been at capacity for several weeks. The hospital has rescheduled about 50 nonemergency procedures in each of the last three weeks.
Although Gesteland said it seems like the RSV epidemic has peaked, it is still bringing patients to hospitals and keeping physicians busy. The flu, however, is reaching last year’s peak levels now, although it is not expected to peak until January or February.
Gesteland said he is hoping after learning about the situation that people are motivated to help prevent the spread of illness to themselves and their loved ones.
Dr. Tamara Sheffield, medical director for preventive medicine at Intermountain Healthcare, said doctors seeing the same issues in adults, with record cases of flu, COVID-19 and RSV. She said the increase of these three respiratory illnesses this year has been called a blizzard.
“We really are seeing an extraordinary amount of infections circulating within the community. And it’s not just putting a strain on the health system but also on the medications we use,” Sheffield said.
She said monoclonal antibody therapies are not working on the current COVID-19 strain, which means the antivirals they are using are in short supply. Sheffield said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued guidance for how to prioritize antivirals used for flu. The flu treatment for children has become hard to get, she said, adding that some doctors have been taking adult medications and reformulating them for use in children.
Because of limitations in treatment options, Sheffield stressed that the best strategy is prevention — flu vaccinations, the bivalent COVID-19 vaccine, masks, staying home when sick, hand washing and covering coughs.
“(These are) things that we know are great ways to prevent respiratory illnesses from spreading. They are working and need to work for us right now,” Sheffield said.
She said it is never too late to get a flu vaccine. She urged people to get their vaccinations today, in order to allow a week or two before the holidays for the vaccine to become effective.
The current flu numbers are the highest the U.S. has seen in the last 10 years, Sheffield said, adding the increase is likely due to lower levels over the last few years and less exposure to illness. She said vaccines help teach immune systems to protect themselves and combat spreading illness.
Gesteland said supply chain issues and demand are also to blame for ongoing limitations in common pediatric medications, including for fever, as well as antibiotics. Although people have been putting information online about how to alter adult medications for children, he said he suggests talking to a pediatrician or pharmacist for advice, checking with neighbors who may have some to spare and treating children with honey, humidifiers or smaller doses of Tylenol or Advil instead of adult cold medications.
He said RSV starts with cold symptoms, a runny nose and sore throat, but it can lead to a more persistent cough, inflammation and pneumonia-like symptoms. If cold symptoms turn into to troubled breathing, Gesteland said, it is time to see a doctor.
Sheffield said the flu is different, as it typically has a very fast onset, instead of starting with a cold. She added that flu and COVID-19 antivirals are most effective if they are used in the first 48 hours that symptoms exist. Shortness of breath and deep, dry coughs can mean a person has COVID-19; Sheffield said, in this case, it can also be good to get tested and get some medication soon.
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exercise may increase the effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines
Having the most protection from severe outcomes following Covid-19 infection is largely attributed to vaccination. But, the shot’s effectiveness may be enhanced by physical activity, a new study found.
Elevated levels of physical activity appeared to be associated with higher effectiveness from the primary series of the Covid-19 vaccination, according to new research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
“The higher the dose of exercise, the greater the protective effect, obviously to an extent,” Jon Patricios, professor of sport and exercise medicine at Wits University in Johannesburg and co-author of the study, tells CNBC Make It.
So, how often and at what intensity should you be exercising to get the most benefit from your Covid-19 vaccinations? Here’s what Patricios and his co-authors discovered.
2.5 hours of exercise a week may increase protection against severe outcomes from Covid in vaccinated people
Researchers found that vaccinated people with the most protection from severe outcomes, like hospitalization, after Covid-19 infection, followed these exercise guidelines:
- Frequency: They completed at least 150 minutes, or two and a half hours, of physical activity each week.
- Intensity: Their physical activity was moderate intensity, which means their heart rate was between 70% or 79% of their maximum heart rate while exercising.
Participants within this group were 2.8 times less likely to develop severe outcomes from Covid-19 than people who rarely exercise. Or, in simpler terms, their vaccines were 25% more effective at protecting them from these outcomes than sedentary people.
In a video embedded in the study, visual representations of weight-lifting and running are highlighted as some of the exercises that the group engaged in.
“It’s likely that at a higher level of physical activity, you’re getting more positive stimulation of that immune response,” says Dr. Elizabeth Joy, senior medical director for wellness and nutrition at Intermountain Healthcare, who wasn’t involved in the study.
“In turn, that results in the observed decrease in disease burden.”
Yet, even vaccinated people who exercised between 60 minutes and 149 minutes were 1.4 times less likely to have severe cases of Covid infection.
Here’s how the study was conducted
Researchers analyzed data collected from the biggest health insurer in South Africa of nearly 200,000 vaccinated adults in the country, including both men and women. At the time that the study was conducted, only the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was available.
The data included Covid-19 PCR test results from February to October of 2021. And the number of minutes of physical activity, step count and heart rate data were tracked for each person using a wearable device.
Exercise may lower chances of severe outcomes from Covid in unvaccinated people, too
“We had another study which showed that in people who contracted Covid – and those were unvaccinated individuals – those who engaged in the recommended 150 minutes a week of exercise, had better outcomes,” says Patricios.
“They were admitted to hospitals less, fewer of them were in the ICU and on respirators and fewer of them died.”
Similar to his research, a study was conducted on over 48,000 participants with Covid, before vaccines were available, to determine if exercise was associated with a lower risk of severe outcomes from the disease.
Researchers found that those who walked or worked out consistently, prior to infection, were about half as likely to be hospitalized due to Covid.
“This just further adds to that evidence base that people who are more physically active are healthier,” says Joy.
While it has been widely studied that exercise can lower risks of noncommunicable diseases like dementia and cancer, “physical activity is also a successful strategy to prevent communicable diseases like Covid-19,” Joy notes.
When it comes to physical activity for better health outcomes, she says, “none is bad, some is good [and] more is better.”
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Biden administration will end monkeypox public health emergency
People line up to get a monkeypox vaccination at a new walk-up monkeypox vaccination site at Barnsdall Art Park on Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2022 in Hollywood, CA.
Brian Van Der Brug | Los Angeles Times | Getty Images
The Biden administration will end the public health emergency declared in response to the monkeypox outbreak, as new infections have declined dramatically and vaccination rates have increased.
The Health and Human Services Department does not expect it will renew the emergency declaration after it expires on Jan. 31 “given the low number of cases today,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement Friday.
“But we won’t take our foot off the gas — we will continue to monitor the case trends closely and encourage all at-risk individuals to get a free vaccine,” he said. “As we move into the next phase of this effort, the Biden-Harris Administration continues working closely with jurisdictions and partners to monitor trends, especially in communities that have been disproportionately affected.”
Becerra declared an emergency in August in an effort to accelerate a vaccination and education campaign as the virus was spreading swiftly in the gay community. The spread of the virus, dubbed “mpox” on Monday by the World Health Organization in order to reduce stigma associated with its name, has slowed drastically since.
Mpox has infected nearly 30,000 people and killed 15 in the U.S. since health officials confirmed the first domestic case in May, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The U.S. outbreak is the largest in the world.
But infections have slowed dramatically since August, when new cases peaked at 638 per day on average. The U.S. is currently averaging about seven new cases a day, according to CDC data.
U.S. health officials have said the outbreak has slowed because vaccinations have increased dramatically, and people have changed their behavior in response to education campaigns about how to avoid infection.
The vaccination campaign got off to a rocky start, with limited supplies resulting in long lines at clinics and protests in some cities. But vaccinations increased significantly after the White House created a task force and HHS declared a public health emergency.
More than 1.1 million doses of the Jynneos vaccine have been administered in the U.S. since the summer. CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky has said about 1.7 million gay and bisexual people who are HIV positive or are taking medication to prevent HIV infection are at highest risk from mpox.
Mpox has spread primarily through sexual contact among men who have sex with men. The virus causes rashes resembling pimples or blisters that can develop in sensitive areas and be very painful. Though mpox is rarely fatal, people with compromised immune systems are at higher risk of severe disease.
The CDC, in a report published in late October, said it is unlikely the U.S. will eradicate mpox in the near future. The virus will probably continue to circulate at low level primarily in communities of men who have sex with men, according to CDC. Though anyone can catch mpox, there’s little evidence of the virus spreading widely in the general population so far, according to CDC.
The global mpox outbreak this year is the largest in history with more than 80,000 confirmed cases in more than 100 countries. The current outbreak is highly unusual because the virus is spreading widely between people in Europe and North America.
Historically, mpox spread at low levels in remote areas of West and Central Africa where people caught the virus from infected animals.
Fox commentator melts down over vaccinations — saying she’s going to be sent to a concentration ‘camp’
Fox contributor Lisa Booth ranted on Sunday that the United States isn’t all that much better than China when it comes to taking away the freedoms of Americans who refuse to be vaccinated.
© provided by RawStory
Photo: Screen capture
Chinese citizens have been protesting as people continue to be quarantined at home, lacking food and medicine. The public has grown angry after the deaths of two children as a result of anti-virus controls restricting their parents from being able to get medical help.
In the United States, Americans can leave their home whether they have the vaccine or not and they’re able to do whatever they want regardless of their vaccine status. Similarly, the U.S. has medical assistance that comes to one’s home when they dial 9-1-1.
Still, Booth maintained that the U.S. and China are really the same, thanks to liberals.
“Nearly half of Democrats wanted to put people like me, who haven’t had a vaccine, in a government camp,” said Booth. She went on to complain that she couldn’t even go out to dinner at restaurants if she wasn’t vaccinated.
“You have Joe Biden, still, purging military heroes who don’t want to get a vaccine,” said Booth.
It’s a mischaracterization of the idea that Biden is purging the anti-vaccine people. The reality is that because soldiers are sent all over the world, they’re required to have all vaccines from Malaria to Hep A and B, the flu vaccine each year, as well as specific immunization for the country to which they’re being deployed, all of which are listed here.
In the case of the military, it is a national security issue, if a virus spreads through an entire unit while overseas it means that the full unit is out of commission. Soldiers who are unwilling to adhere to military rules and the orders of commanders are always free to leave. Following military leaders and orders, however, are key requirements of being in the military.
Vaccinations were a big strategy that helped Americans be safe in World War II. During the Spanish-American war, Civil War and World War I, the disease death rate compared to battle deaths was enough that it dramatically impact the power of the American military, one key report explained in 2016.
“Before World War II, soldiers died more often of disease than of battle injuries. The ratio of disease-to-battle casualties was approximately 5-to-1 in the Spanish-American War and 2-to-1 in the Civil War,” said the report. Improved sanitation reduced disease casualties in World War I, but it could not protect troops from the 1918 influenza pandemic. During the outbreak, flu accounted for roughly half of US military casualties in Europe.”
A recent report revealed that in Republican counties deaths from COVID-19 are six times higher than that of Democratic counties.
See Booth’s complaints below or at the video here:
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Stop saying fully vaccinated, use ‘up-to-date’ instead
If you still say “fully vaccinated” for Covid, it’s time to stop.
With new boosters on the market and an ever-evolving virus, experts say the term no longer means being the most protected you can be. They point to two, far more appropriate alternatives to use in this current phase of the pandemic: “up-to-date” with Covid vaccines or simply indicating whether you’ve gotten your latest booster shot.
“I certainly would say that we need to stop using it, set that aside altogether. ‘Fully vaccinated’ is not the term that we want to use,” Cindy Prins, an epidemiologist at the University of Florida, tells CNBC Make It.
The definition of fully vaccinated hasn’t changed since the first Covid vaccines were rolled out almost two years ago. It means two initial doses of a vaccine from Pfizer, Moderna or Novavax, or one dose from Johnson & Johnson. It’s synonymous with completing your primary series of Covid vaccines.
Here’s why experts say you shouldn’t use the term anymore, and what you should do instead:
What’s wrong with saying ‘fully vaccinated?’
“Fully vaccinated” was originally a simple way to remind most people — anyone who didn’t get J&J’s vaccine — that they needed two shots instead of one to get full protection against Covid during late 2020 and early 2021, Prins says.
But Covid has changed a lot since then, and so has the meaning of being fully protected.
Last year, the emergence of new variants like delta and omicron fueled new infections and reinfections among fully vaccinated Americans. It became clear that a primary series’ protection against infection started to wane after a few months, and that booster doses were required to prevent severe outcomes from Covid, says Prins.
To put it simply, being fully vaccinated doesn’t give you full protection against Covid anymore. Even if you recently finished your primary series, omicron’s BA.5 subvariant and a flurry of other sublineages appear increasingly adept at dodging the protection you get from the original mRNA vaccines.
What should I say instead?
Say you’re “up-to-date” on your Covid vaccines, Prins recommends. It’s a quick way of acknowledging that if you’re eligible for a shot, you’ve received it — meaning you’re the most protected you can be in that moment.
The shift in your vocabulary could affect how you communicate with the people around you. For example, you should make sure loved ones are “up-to-date” on their vaccines before coming to a gathering you’re organizing, Prins says.
The phrase does run the risk of feeling jargony, says Susan Hassig, an associate professor of epidemiology at Tulane University. “If you ask if a person is up-to-date, there’s an assumption that they have a shared understanding about what it means — and they may not,” she says.
Hassig points to a more “functional question” you can ask instead: Have you gotten the new booster?
“Being far more explicit in what you’re asking would be a good thing if they don’t know what [up-to-date] means,” she says.
You can always educate the people around you about what “up-to-date” means, Prins notes. That may also involve knowing the eligibility guidelines for different Covid shots, and finding “respectful” ways to ask friends or family members whether they meet a dose’s requirements.
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Omicron Covid boosters appear to work, regardless of side effects
If you already got your omicron-specific Covid booster, you might have experienced some side effects. Maybe even ones that were more intense than your previous shot.
But there’s no need to worry: Experts and new data say the new shots appear to work — regardless of whether you experience moderate, mild or no side effects at all.
“Don’t focus too much on side effects, because I really think that the main objective here is to get people to be protected. So focus on that benefit of the new vaccines,” Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, a professor of pediatric infectious diseases at Stanford University’s School of Medicine, tells CNBC Make It.
The new boosters gained approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the CDC before they finished clinical trials. But newly released data from Pfizer and BioNTech’s ongoing clinical trial gives a first glimpse of how well its new shots work on humans, showing that the new boosters generated a strong immune response against omicron’s BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants.
About 11.5 million Americans have rolled up their sleeves to get the booster since they were first sent out at the beginning of September, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More Americans could follow: Roughly a third of U.S. adults say they’ve already gotten one or intend to “as soon as possible,” according to a Kaiser Family Foundation poll released Sept. 30.
Here’s what you need to know about the protection the new boosters provide, and where side effects fit into the equation:
The new booster appears to give you protection
Pfizer and Moderna’s redesigned shots are bivalent, meaning they’re tailored to the original Covid strain and omicron BA.4 and BA.5. All Americans ages 5 and older are eligible for one if they’ve completed their primary vaccination series.
Like previous Covid vaccines, the new boosters are designed to help you fight the virus by triggering an immune response in your body. When you get a vaccine, your immune system recognizes it as something foreign because it mimics a Covid infection without causing the “full-blown sickness,” Maldonado says.
Your immune system responds by producing an arsenal of weapons — including antibodies, memory B cells and T cells — that work together to hunt down the “foreign object” and remember how to fend it off in the future, she adds.
Pfizer says its clinical trials were successful in inducing that immune response: A week after injection, participants had higher levels of antibodies against BA.4 and BA.5 in their blood than they did pre-injection. The drugmaker didn’t specify how much higher those antibody counts were, but said it expects to release data measuring antibody levels one-month post-booster “in the coming weeks.”
Such data might better measure the full protection Pfizer’s new booster can provide against omicron’s subvariants. Covid vaccines typically take two to three weeks to fully ramp up your immunity, which can help your body stop an infection from happening or keep it from progressing to severe disease.
“We know the data isn’t complete, but it’s also reassuring that after seven days you’re already seeing an increase in antibodies,” Maldanado says. “The response is very consistent with what we’ve seen in the past with other vaccines.”
What does it mean if your side effects are more intense than others?
Side effects — in this case, the now-familiar set of muscle aches, fatigue, headaches and more — are a natural part of our immune response to a vaccine, Maldonado says. Clinical trials on earlier versions of bivalent boosters targeting omicron’s BA.1 subvariant found that most participants experienced “mild” side effects, with much smaller percentages reporting “moderate” or “severe” ones.
Out in the real world, the severity seems to be “kind of a mixed bag,” Maldonado says: Some people may have a worse, similar or more mild experience compared to their prior vaccine doses. “There’s going to be some risk of side effects. For most people, you’re going to feel something, but that doesn’t mean vaccines aren’t safe or won’t protect you,” she adds.
Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease professor from UC San Francisco, says he certainly felt some “adverse side effects” after he received his updated booster. He notes that he got a flu shot at the same time, and while the side effects from both shots are nothing new, he suggests they may have “conflated” to cause a more an intense experience for him.
Some studies show that the chances of experiencing side effects after receiving both shots at the same time are similar or only slightly higher than when receiving a Covid vaccine alone. So, there’s really no concrete explanation for cases where your side effects from the new booster are more or less severe than others.
But you shouldn’t worry, emphasizes Dr. Helen Chu, an assistant professor of infectious diseases at the University of Washington: Your side effects don’t correlate with how much protection a Covid shot gives you. Having mild or moderate side effects doesn’t mean you’re mounting a stronger immune response than people with no side effects, she says.
“You’re still going to have a nice rise to your antibody levels, you’re still very much protected either way,” Chu says.
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Fewer Americans plan to get a flu shot this season 2022
Only 49% of U.S. adults plan to get their flu shot this flu season, according to a survey conducted by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases (NFID). Even 1 in 5 of those who are at higher risk for influenza-related complications say they won’t get vaccinated.
People who are more likely to have severe outcomes from a flu infection include those over the age of 65, pregnant people, children younger than five years old, and individuals with underlying conditions, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We know flu vaccination remains the best way to protect yourself and your family from flu,” said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC, during the NFID’s conference on Tuesday.
Most Americans agree. Nearly 70% believe that getting an annual flu vaccination is the best way to prevent influenza-related deaths and hospitalizations, the NFID found. And yet many people remain hesitant to get their vaccine.
Instead, more U.S. adults are gravitating towards masking as a form of protection against the flu. A higher percentage of Americans (58%) plan to mask at least sometimes this flu season than intend to get vaccinated.
Why more Americans are skipping the flu shot — and what they’re doing instead
Here are some of the top reasons adults gave for not getting vaccinated this season:
- 41% think flu shots don’t work very well
- 39% are concerned about the vaccine’s side effects
- 28% say they never get the flu
- 24% are concerned about getting the flu from the shot
- 20% do not think influenza is a serious illness
“With Covid, people have forgotten about influenza. This is another serious winter respiratory virus, it can do bad damage to you,” William Schaffner, medical director of NFID, said at the conference. “The key to prevention is vaccination.”
The altered approach this flu season may be partly due to the timing of the omicron-specific booster and people’s concerns with getting both the updated Covid booster and the flu shot. Just 32% of U.S. adults are very confident that it is safe to receive the vaccines at the same time, the survey shows.
The CDC affirms that doing so has proven to be safe. Studies of over 450,000 people indicate that only mild symptoms are experienced after receiving the immunizations simultaneously, says Walensky, adding that, “Most of those are resolved really quite quickly.”
Meanwhile, choosing to get one vaccination over the other is not a wise decision, Walensky warns. It’s useful to increase your body’s defenses against both viruses.
And, she reiterates, bundling them together is easy as well as safe: “You want to make sure you get both, and it’s often more convenient to get them both at the same time.”
Common symptoms after receiving a Covid vaccine and flu shot at the same time typically include:
- Soreness at the injection site or in the arm where the shot was administered
- Fatigue
- Headache
“Flu vaccines work. For more than 50 years, hundreds of millions of Americans have safely received their vaccines,” said Patricia Stinchfield, president of NFID. “Why take the risk of going unvaccinated?”
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