2007-2008 Flu Vaccine Not as Effective

The CDC released a report about the effectiveness of this year’s flu vaccine stating that the vaccine may not cover two of the three most prevalent strains of the flu virus in the wild this year.

Every year the flu vaccine is a crap shoot. The experts at the Centers for Disease Control and similar agencies worldwide look at the evidence about the upcoming flu season and make educated guesses about which varieties of flu causing viruses for which to create a vaccine.

This year is one of the years when they guessed wrong and missed with 2 of the three selections. Does this mean that the flu shots are useless?

The CDC report says no. Anyone who received the flu shot this year and later becomes infected with one of the less covered strains of the flu will likely have a much milder case than if they hadn’t had any protection.

Of greater concern in this report is the statement that 4.5% of the circulating strains (all H1N1 versions of the virus) are resistant to Tamiflu. Tamiflu is one of the two antiviral medications that helps reduce the severity of influenza when administered to patients early in their illness.

The other antiviral treatment, Relenza, is still effective and shows no signs of viral resistance at this time.