An important flu follow-up
I told you a while ago about the benefits of the flu
vaccine – fewer infections, fewer hospitalizations.
And that it was much less risky than many thought – no
increased risk of Guillain-Barre Syndrome, for example.
Well, here’s yet another pro-flu vaccine report.
It’s in the journal, Science
Translational Medicine, and the upshot here is that the researchers
conclude that infection with a flu virus increases the risk of developing
bacterial pneumonia 100-fold.
Underline that: that’s a 100 times higher risk of getting
pneumonia if you get the flu than if you don’t get it.
Why this matters so much is that pneumonia is the world’s
number one infectious disease killer, and while vaccines against pneumonia
lower the risk of getting pneumonia, they clearly don’t eliminate that risk.
So it’s nice to note that there is something else you can
do to prevent coming down with pneumonia: get your flu shot when it becomes
available.
