Flu shot did poor job against worst bug in seniors
Photo
In this Tuesday, Jan. 15, 2013 file photo, Carlos Maisonet, 73, reacts as Dr. Eva Berrios-Colon, a professor at Touro College of Pharmacy, injects him with flu vaccine during a visit to the faculty practice center at Brooklyn Hospital in New York. Health officials said Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013 this season's flu shot was only 9 percent effective in protecting seniors against the most common and dangerous flu bug. Flu vaccine tends to protect younger people better than older ones and is never 100 percent effective. But experts say the preliminary results are disappointing and highlight the need for a better vaccine.
ATLANTA — This year’s flu shot is doing a startlingly dismal job of protecting senior citizens from the harshest strain this season, proving only 9 percent effective, the government said Thursday.
Health officials don’t know why this is so, but it helps explain why so many older people have been hospitalized with the flu this year.
Flu vaccine tends to protect younger people better than older ones and never works as well as other kinds of vaccines. But experts say the preliminary results for seniors are disappointing and highlight the urgent need for a better vaccine.
Overall, the vaccine’s effectiveness is a moderate 56 percent, which means those who got a shot have a 56 percent lower chance of winding up at the doctor with the flu. That is nearly as good as other flu seasons, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday.
For those 65 and older, it offers far less protection. It is 27 percent effective against the three strains in the vaccine, the lowest in about a decade but not far below from what’s expected. But the vaccine did a particularly poor job of protecting older people against the toughest flu bug, which is causing more than three-quarters of the illnesses this year. CDC officials say it’s not clear why.
Vaccinations are recommended for anyone over 6 months, and health officials stress that some vaccine protection is better than none at all. While it’s likely that older people who were vaccinated are still getting sick, many of them may be getting less severe symptoms.
“Year in and year out, the vaccine is the best protection we have,” and vaccinations are still recommended for senior citizens, said CDC flu expert Dr. Joseph Bresee.
To be sure, the preliminary data for seniors is less than definitive. It is based on fewer than 300 people scattered among five states.
But it will no doubt surprise many people that the effectiveness is that low, said Michael Osterholm, a University of Minnesota infectious disease expert who has tried to draw attention to the need for a more effective flu vaccine.
Older people have weaker immune systems that don’t respond as well to flu shots and are more vulnerable to the flu and its complications, including pneumonia.
Health officials at a meeting Thursday said they don’t know why this year’s vaccine did so poorly in that age group. One theory, as yet unproven, is that seniors’ immune systems were accustomed to strains from the last two years and had more trouble switching gears to handle this year’s different, harsh strain.
Among infectious diseases, flu is considered one of the nation’s leading killers. On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.
This flu season started in early December, a month earlier than usual, and peaked by the end of year. Hospitalization rates for people 65 and older have been some of the highest in a decade, at 146 per 100,000 people.
Flu viruses tend to mutate more quickly than others, so a new vaccine is formulated each year to target the three strains expected to be the major threats. But that involves guesswork.
Because of these challenges, scientists tend to set a lower bar for flu vaccine. While childhood vaccines against diseases like measles are expected to be 90 or 95 percent effective, a flu vaccine that’s 60 to 70 percent effective in the U.S. is considered pretty good. By that standard, this year’s vaccine is OK.
For seniors, a flu vaccine is considered pretty good if it’s in the 30 to 40 percent range, said Dr. Arnold Monto, a University of Michigan flu expert.
A high-dose version of the flu show was recently made available for those 65 and older but the new study was too small to show whether that made a difference this year.
The CDC estimates are based on about 2,700 people who got sick in December and January. The researchers traced back to see who had gotten flu shots and who hadn’t. An earlier, smaller study put the vaccine’s overall effectiveness at 62 percent but other factors that might influence that figure weren’t taken into account.
The CDC’s Bresee said there’s a danger in providing preliminary results because it may result in people doubting — or skipping — flu shots. But the data was released to warn older people who got shots that they may still get sick and shouldn’t ignore any serious flu-like symptoms, he said.
The new data highlights an evolution in how experts are evaluating flu vaccine effectiveness. For years, it was believed that if the viruses in the vaccine matched the ones spreading around the country, then the vaccine would be effective.
This year’s shot was a good match to the bugs going around this winter, including the harsher H3N2 that tends to make people sicker. Yet the season proved to be a moderately severe one, with many illnesses occurring in people who’d been vaccinated.
A slate of new vaccines will be available next summer, including some that protect against as many of four strains of flu and some that can be made more quickly. But experts say it’s not clear whether they will be any more effective.
Feb 25, 2013 at 2:14 p.m.
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You can also be killed by a flu shot. As in the case of this 7 year old girl.
http://www.7dvt.com/2012flu-shot-or-not-...
Feb 23, 2013 at 5:25 p.m.
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from personal experience this year, I have to agree that getting the vaccine is the best thing to do. I lost my 39 yr old sister who was healthy with NO underlying conditions. She had 2 strains of the flu and was NOT vaccinated. Had she got the flu shot, she would have had a better chance as her body would have already had some antibody protection. The dr stated that you can still get other strains after vaccination but that your illness will be shortened in severity and duration. I wish she and her family had gotten their shots. She might still be here and her young children would not be motherless now. :( Preventative care is ALWAYS the best thing to do to reduce a poor outcome.
Feb 22, 2013 at 3:39 p.m.
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zdog, in fairness, the article notes that the CDC doesn't understand (yet) why it has been less effective this year for older adults. It probably is a factor as yet undetermined having to do with the characteristics of one of the strains in circulation, and will take months of following up on individual cases to sort out.
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It's dangerous to conclude, though, that because this year's vaccine did poorly with older adults that EVERYONE might as well stop taking it. The entire point of vaccination is community immunity, as this graphic describes:
http://www.vaccines.gov/basics/protectio...
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People who take the vaccine don't get sick, but it's actually EVEN MORE IMPORTANT that they stop becoming a vector for getting other people sick. The spread of the viral strain is stopped in its tracks by your own immune system BECAUSE it was given the signature to react to that strain in the vaccine.
Feb 22, 2013 at 10:36 a.m.
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From the CDC:
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Can people receiving the nasal-spray flu vaccine LAIV (FluMist®) pass the vaccine viruses to others?
In clinical studies, transmission of vaccine viruses to close contacts has occurred only rarely. The current estimated risk of getting infected with vaccine virus after close contact with a person vaccinated with the nasal-spray flu vaccine is low (0.6%-2.4%). Because the viruses are weakened, infection is unlikely to result in influenza illness symptoms since the vaccine viruses have not been shown to mutate into typical or naturally occurring influenza viruses.
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Feb 22, 2013 at 6:25 a.m.
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if you get a flu shot, YOU can still spread flu virus. If you don't get the flu shot you can spread flu virus. Flu virus spreads just fine with our without vaccines. If you get any of the nasal vaccines YOU ARE most definitely shedding live virus to those around you for up to a week after vaccination.
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This years vaccine was a very good match for the virus in circulation so it has nothing to do with not getting the strains correct.
Feb 22, 2013 at 6:03 a.m.
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The story means getting the flu shot helps prevent the flu. People who don't get the shot contribute to spreading the flu.
Which means people who don't get the shot and don't get the flu benefited from the people who did get the shot.
Which means if no one got the shot there'd be a flu epidemic.
Feb 22, 2013 at 5:43 a.m.
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not the fault of me---> Yada...It's the Republicans... :-)
Feb 22, 2013 at 5:28 a.m.
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Yadda, yadda, bla, bla. Those naysayers don't have to get a flu shot if they don't want to. I'll continue to get mine
Feb 22, 2013 at 4:57 a.m.
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That's why I NEVER get a flu shot.
Feb 22, 2013 at 2:50 a.m.
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MikeF, the flu is easily dealt with if you are a normal, healthy adult. It's the young, the elderly, and the immune-compromised (e.g. diabetes, cancer) that are at risk. By not taking the shot yourself you are spreading the virus and increasing the likelihood that someone vulnerable will get the virus, EVEN IF you never experience a serious illness yourself. That is why they want everyone to get the flu shot.
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The vaccine is less effective this year because they cannot predict the EXACT mix of viral strains that will be in the population. They need to make a decision that far in advance in order to grow enough of the vaccine. Most years they do well, but not every year, and unfortunately this year that was the case.
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MOST YEARS the vaccine will be effective because history shows that health authorities do a reasonably good job of prediction. It is, however, only a forecast, much like the weather, and can be a little bit wrong or rarely a lot wrong. The effectiveness of the vaccine this year does not reflect the overall historical effectiveness. The flu is hundreds, even thousands of different individual viruses and every year a few of them are new.
Feb 21, 2013 at 11:07 p.m.
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"Overall, the vaccine’s effectiveness is a moderate 56 percent, which means those who got a shot have a 56 percent lower chance of winding up at the doctor with the flu."
In my 40+ years I have had the flu many times and never went to the doctor for it. even though I have almost never gotten this drug.
Feb 21, 2013 at 7:19 p.m.
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Despite the second sentence of the paragraph below, the entire paragraph means that the percent of effectiveness is not far below what is normal for people 65 and older. The deaths of the oldest people is almost entirely offset by younger people who are still over 65.
"For those 65 and older, it offers far less protection. It is 27 percent effective against the three strains in the vaccine, the lowest in about a decade but not far below from what’s expected. But the vaccine did a particularly poor job of protecting older people against the toughest flu bug, which is causing more than three-quarters of the illnesses this year. CDC officials say it’s not clear why."
And the 56% overall is nearly as good as in previous years. As is the case many times, the headline distorts what's in the story.
Feb 21, 2013 at 6:14 p.m.
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Um - yeah, I did. It says, "This year’s flu shot is doing a startlingly dismal job of protecting senior citizens from the harshest strain this season, proving only 9 percent effective, the government said Thursday."
Feb 21, 2013 at 5:40 p.m.
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Did you two actually read the story?
Feb 21, 2013 at 5:32 p.m.
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How many months have they used scare tactics to tell EVERYONE to go get a flu shot? A well-engineered money making scam is all it's been.
Feb 21, 2013 at 4:29 p.m.
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What a freaking Joke the Modern Medical is trying sell us. Line up like cattle and let them "experiment" with your lives. I swear, in a 100 years they will look back and laugh at what they did to us.
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