You may discover yourself going to the physician’s surgery or drugstore in the coming weeks or months to obtain your yearly flu vaccine and dosage of COVID vaccination. Sadly, you’ll need two separate injections.
Although two pharmaceutical firms are developing on the flu/COVID boost, the solitary vaccine will not be available this flu year. However, infection physicians believe that getting your flu vaccine and COVID vaccine simultaneously is safe.
Is A COVID Flu Vaccine On The Way?
“It certainly hasn’t inhibited the armed forces,” said Schaffner, a professor, “When you’re a recruit, you get needled. You get a whole bunch of vaccines simultaneously.”
“And the CDC [U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] has said explicitly you can get your first, second, or if they’re recommended booster COVID vaccines at the same time that you get your flu shot,” Schaffner added.
To prevent the spread of the virus, there is no other way present with experts except going for the vaccination. However, if the same vaccine of COVID can also prevent flu, it can be a better option as one does not have to go for two different treatments. Hence the experts focus on this option as it can protect one from flu and viral infection from COVID.
The other week, Moderna informed analysts that the company intends to develop an annual combination vaccination that defends against some viral pathogens, such as flu, COVID, and rhinovirus. Moderna and Novavax, both drug industries, have revealed that they would then be researching a combined flu/COVID vaccination in anticipation of the necessity for annual COVID boosters in the coming.
“I do not think that this is going to be something available in the short term, especially not for this flu season as flu vaccinations have already become available,” he said.
“They’re looking to the future,” Schaffner said of the drug companies. “They think COVID boosters will be necessary, and they’re even laying their bet this might be a good idea on an annual basis because that would be the schedule in which you would need to get a flu vaccine. They’re thinking about that pretty seriously and have invested a bunch of science in it.”
According to Adalja, many additional combo vaccinations are now on the marketplace, such as tetanus/diphtheria/pertussis (Tdap) and measles/mumps/rubella (MMR).
Infectious diseases specialists such as Schaffner& Adalja are ready for an influenza season that may be even severe than the previous year. Flu occurrences remained at only those low in 2020-2021, as per the CDC, as epidemic precautions, including masks and significant discrepancies, also helped keep influenza away.
“People are concerned because we’re doing exactly the opposite of what we did last year,” Schaffner said. “We’re going out instead of staying home. The kids are in school rather than learning virtually. So we anticipate there will be influenza this year. We can’t tell you how much, but we think there will be influenza, so we’re going to have to reintroduce everyone to this other respiratory virus which is also nasty influenza.”
“It’s unclear whether influenza will be a major factor this season because there has not been much flu circulating even in the Southern Hemisphere, and there are some residual COVID-19 mitigation measures that people are taking,” Adalja said. “But influenza has a special status, and it is very important to be prepared for whatever the season may hold.”
Overall, 100% flu vaccination adoption, particularly among at-risk groups, would’ve been ideal this season. Natural immunity may develop due to pretty consensus uptake, protecting people for whom the vaccination is useless. Moreover, as lockdowns are unavoidably lifted, a drop in hospital stays and hospitalizations will relieve institutions and enable organizations to cope better with COVID-19 issues.
