Most US Adults Have Not Gotten A Flu Shot For This Mild Season

(CNN) — Most US adults have not gotten a flu shot this season, according to a new survey from NORC, a research organization at the University of Chicago. As of mid-November, only 43% of surveyed people 18 or older said they had gotten vaccinated against the flu, according to NORC, which has conducted the National Immunization Survey for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention since 2005. Another 14% who remain unvaccinated claim that they will get the shot, the survey indicates. Even if they do as they intend, that leaves considerably more than a third of adults (41%) who have not — and will not — get a flu shot, according to NORC. (The remaining 2% either did not answer or responded, “I don’t know.”) The report comes early in what has been a mild season. Thirty-eight states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico experienced minimal flu activity for the week ending December 1, while New York City and 10 states experienced low or moderate activity, according to Friday’s weekly flu report from the CDC. Only two states, Georgia and Louisiana, experienced high activity during the week. The mild season is a dramatic shift from the previous flu season, which was the deadliest in decades, with more than 80,000 flu-related deaths in the United States. ‘It’s still very, very early’ “We cannot claim that the 43% of vaccinated people is the reason for the mild flu season so far,” said Richard Webby, a f...
Source: WBZ-TV - Breaking News, Weather and Sports for Boston, Worcester and New Hampshire - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Health News Flu Flu Shot Local TV Source Type: news