Yes, You Should Get a Flu Shot in 2018. Here ’s Everything to Know

The 2017-2018 flu season was a bad one. The dominant viral strain, H3N2, was a particularly severe form of influenza, leading to widespread and serious illness across the country. The flu and its complications killed around 80,000 people last year, the CDC estimates, including 180 children. That’s the highest flu death toll in four decades. Experts say early indications suggest that this year’s flu season will be milder, but the memory of last winter should still serve as motivation to get the flu shot this fall. Here’s what you need to know about the 2018 flu shot. When should I get the flu shot? The CDC recommends getting your flu shot by the end of October, before the bulk of the 2018-2019 flu season hits, because it takes about two weeks for the flu shot to take effect. But don’t give up if you miss that window — you can still get a flu shot well into the fall or winter, says Dr. Tanaya Bhowmick, an assistant professor of medicine and infectious diseases at Rutgers’ Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. “It’s never too late to get the flu vaccine,” Bhowmick says. How effective is the flu shot? The formulation of the flu shot is tweaked every year, in an effort to target the specific strains of influenza that are likely to circulate during that flu season. But without knowing exactly which strains will get people sick, it’s impossible to predict exactly how effective it will be in any given year. During the brutal ...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized healthytime onetime public health Source Type: news