Concern Mounts After CDC Says This Season's Flu Vaccine Only 23 Percent Effective
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Concern is growing about this year's flu vaccine after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it's only 23 percent effective, which is one of the worst performances in the last decade.
The poor showing is primarily because the vaccine doesn't include the bug that is making most people sick, health officials say. In the last decade, flu vaccines at their best were 50 to 60 percent effective.
"This is an uncommon year,'' said Dr. Alicia Fry, a flu vaccine expert at the CDC, who was involved in the study.
Each year, the flu vaccine is reformulated, based on experts' best guess at which three or four strains will be the biggest problem. Those decisions are usually made in February, months before the flu season, to give companies that make flu shots and nasal spray vaccine enough time to make enough doses.
But this year's formula didn't include the strain of H3N2 virus that ended up causing about two-thirds of the illnesses this winter. And that strain tends to cause more hospitalizations and deaths, particularly in the elderly, making this a particularly bad winter to have a problem with the flu vaccine.
"This is the second least effective vaccine in the last 10 years," CBS medical contributor, Dr. Holly Phillips, explained Friday on "CBS This Morning." "That's ultimately because it's not well matched with the predominate strain that is circulating right now, which is H3N2. Basically, that strain drifted or mutated in some way after the flu vaccine was already made."
Indeed, the flu season is shaping up to be a bad one. Health officials are comparing it to the bad flu season two winters ago, and this one may prove to be worse. Hospitalization rates in people 65 and older are higher than they were at the same point in the 2012-2013 season, according to CDC data.
Across New York state, there have been more than 4,100 confirmed cases just last week. In New York City, about 200 people have been admitted to city hospitals with flu symptoms this month alone, CBS2's Janelle Burrell reported.
"I never get the flu shots because I really don't believe they work. The two years in a row that I got the flu shot, I got the flu," said Upper East Side resident Wendy Stewart Kaplan.
The study involved 2,321 people in five states -- Michigan, Pennsylvania, Texas, Wisconsin and Washington -- who had respiratory illnesses from November to early January. The researchers said vaccinated people had a 23 percent lower chance of winding up at the doctor with the flu.
The CDC began regularly tracking the effectiveness of the flu vaccine during the 2004-2005 season, but the results for the first few years were from smaller studies and are considered less reliable. Effectiveness has ranged from 47 percent to 60 percent in the last half-dozen years, when studies involved larger numbers of patients.
But health officials say people should still get a flu shot this year.
"Even if you get the flu, you may have a milder reaction and certainly I think some protection is always better than no protection," Westchester County Health Commissioner Dr. Sherlita Amler told WCBS 880's Sean Adams.
And treating symptoms early is key.
"The virus itself is, generally, well controlled with good vaccination, good hand washing, there are anti flu medications that are available as well and taking them early in the course of flu-like symptoms is very helpful," said pediatrician Dr. Bruce Sacks.
Recently, the flu season in the U.S. has peaked in January or February, but people can continue to get sick for months. And they could get infected by the flu strains that were included in this year's version.
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