Vaccinate against the flu

The reader Pia F. asks: "My general practitioner says that I should get a flu shot, I did it a few years ago and I still had a cold. heard that the vaccine has not worked in the past year, is it really worth it, is the flu so dangerous, can not I just get through and even strengthen my defense system? "

Winfried Randerath They ask important questions. First, it is important to distinguish the true flu (flu) from the many colds that plague us. Influenza is an insidious and dangerous disease. She visits the world every year, every month of winter. This is in the southern hemisphere, a year and a half before our winter. This has the advantage for the inhabitants of our regions to know which viruses are coming to us. Because the flu virus has the property of changing every year. Most of these are small changes in the structure of the virus, but every two or three years there are also big changes. This makes it difficult for our defense system to detect and fight viruses repeatedly. The flu, for example, causes an extremely high number of people each year and is also one of the most common fatal infectious diseases.

The last influenza year 2017/2018 was particularly bad. The wave lasted from the last week of December to the beginning of April. For decades, many diseases have never been detected or reported. In Germany, nine million people consulted a doctor because of the flu, 5.3 million had to be on sick leave and 45,000 had to be hospitalized. In Berlin alone, an additional 1,100 deaths are expected during the flu epidemic. For the whole of the republic, an estimated 50,000 additional deaths.

As the flu virus changes every year, we also need to get vaccinated every year. In fact, the vaccine was ineffective last year. The composition did not detect the main influenza virus. However, important conclusions were drawn for the following season. Of course, the vaccine only protects against the flu virus, not against other cold viruses. You may still have a cold, but the flu vaccine protects you from this dangerous disease in the best possible way. This is also because the vaccine is well tolerated. It is recommended for all people over 60, pregnant women, all people with chronic diseases, people who work in the medical field, who are very popular with the population, with elderly people or boarders.

Another vaccine is often confused with influenza vaccine: the so-called pneumococcal vaccine, the vaccine against the most common bacteria that cause pneumonia. Here it is not recommended to vaccinate twice a year with different substances every six years.