The polio vaccine is also clearly more effective at limiting the disease than the flu or covid vaccines (granted that this is in part just the nature of the virus).
Indeed - from my understanding, they have to "guess"timate which strains of Flu will be prevalent in a given year, if they get it right, fantastic - if they get it wrong, lower effectiveness. Of course, it's not really a guess so much as an educated assessment.
Having said that, as an asthmatic I've had the Flu vaccine every year for the last 20 or so years, and knock on wood haven't had Flu since. I also had the multivalent pneumonia vaccine a while ago, so fingers crossed!
TBH my last flu vaccine was something like 25 years ago (I am not antivax, I am just too lazy to get it) and I had "true" flu (not seasonal colds or covid) precisely once since then.
My doctor friend doesn't get flu vaccine even when recommended, because, to quote her, "in my line of work, I was already exposed to everything ten times at least". She works as an ORL expert in a big hospital, so she is constantly staring down some sick throats.
I try to get them when I remember. There's more evidence , especially since Covid open peoples eyes, that colds , flus etc can have long term effects even after they are gone.
Just to be clear, there is no vaccine for the common cold, nor has there been any evidence, such as a properly conducted study, to suggest a cold can have long term effects.
Interesting, I have many family members who work in healthcare and all who are in regular contact with patients are required, by hospital policy, to get the flu vaccine annually. They would not be allowed to clock in if they don't get vaccinated as its determined to be a risk to the patients (the Dr or nurse can easily become typhoid mary).
Here, such policies vary even across a single hospital. Some healthcare workers are required by law to be vaxed against HepB or HepA, or measles, or rabies, but flu is, nation-wide, only "recommended".
> (I am not antivax, I am just too lazy to get it)
Startup idea - vaccine delivery service. Pay a fee or subscription and someone comes to your house or workplace and jabs you with flu vaccine plus any travel shots required.
Funnily enough, this was the first year I got a flu vaccine, because it was being offered basically at my door and I thought it'd be useful to have before visiting family. I still managed to get sick afterwards, just instead of a flu it ended up being a particularly bad viral cold.
Not a slight against the flu shot, just a funny tidbit since it reminded me that the vaccine doesn't make me invincible from all similar disease.
While it's just an anecdote, it's more than just a funny tidbit as an increased risk of non-influenza respiratory virus is a possible side effect of flu vaccines.
"We identified a statistically significant increased risk of noninfluenza respiratory virus infection among TIV recipients (Table 3), including significant increases in the risk of rhinovirus and coxsackie/echovirus infection" [1]
That's one of the complications in assessing efficacy: if the benefit in flu vaccine is potentially quite modest (as determined by some long-running studies [2]), and it causes an increased risk of other noninfluenza respiratory viruses, then we need higher-quality, more detailed studies to understand what's happening.
But based on the discussion of the Cochrane review it seems unlikely. [3]
