Early Signs Point Toward Rough TN Flu Season

The first cold snap of the fall serves as a reminder to get your flu shot. And early signs show you may need it.

Dr. Michelle Fiscus heads Tennessee Immunization Program. Fiscus said Amercian health providers watch carefully the Australian winter flu season for signs as to what the United States may deal as fall and winter arrive. The news does not look good down under.

“Very severe flu with a lot of people who are sick,” Fiscus said.

Ten Tennessee children died in the first two months of this year from the flu. Overall, 80,000 Americans died from the flu last year.

“Many, many of those deaths, probably 75 percent of them, would have been prevented if those people had received flu vaccines,” Fiscus said.

The World Health Organization helps develop the plan for which strains go into the flu vaccine. Fiscus said it involves “guesswork and finger-crossing” to help protect as many people as possible.

“What we know is that even if there’s not a great match in the strains that are selected for the vaccine and what we see come through in that year, just having antibodies to flu is very protective in preventing hospitalization and ICU admissions and death from flu,” Fiscus said.

Complicating the fight against the flu even more, Fiscus said the virus can mutate during the flu season. That happened a year ago causing widespread flu outbreaks nationwide.

Fiscus said health officials often hear people saying they do not get a flu shot because in the years they get the shot, they get the flu — or — it makes them sick.

“The injected flu vaccine is absolutely, scientifically, biologically incapable of making you sick,” Fiscus said.

Flu shots are available through local retailers as well as your local health department.