CDC: This Season’s Flu Vaccine Is Only 23 Percent Effective.

Three major television news programs, major newspapers, wire sources and Internet media outlets report on the CDC’s finding that this season’s influenza vaccine is just 23 percent effective due to a mismatch with the predominant H3N2 virus strain. Despite that finding, nearly all of the coverage emphasizes that despite this year’s decreased effectiveness, it is still worthwhile to get a flu shot. that even with flu vaccine effectiveness (VE) “at 10%, a vaccine could prevent about 13,000 flu-related hospitalizations among senior citizens in the US, the CDC researchers” wrote in findings published in the Jan. 16 issue of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The report also revealed that children ages six months to 17 years appear to benefit most from the current flu shot, having a VE of 26%. In “adults, the VE was 12% for people ages 18 to 49 and 14% for people 50 and older,” figures “too small to be statistically significant.” http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-flu-vaccine-effectiveness-20150115-story.html