RICHMOND, Va. -- It's that time of the year many dread, flu season — but this one is different than those in the past. Numbers show this flu season is starting earlier, and some health experts suggest it could also be more severe.
"What it sounds like from the experience in the Southern Hemisphere was an early flu season with some severe flu cases, which we have each year," said Dr. Sean McKenna, pediatrician at the Children's Hospital of Richmond. "But we're expecting it to be early this year, so we're trying to get families ramped up for their flu vaccines as early as possible."
According to CDC data, fewer people have gotten their flu shot this year than at this same time last year, but 91.2 million doses of flu vaccine have been distributed throughout the country.
"The more folks that get their flu shot, the more we can bring down community transmission, which ultimately helps protect more vulnerable people in our communities, like people who are older or babies are immunocompromised or pregnant people," noted Cat Long, spokesperson for the Richmond and Henrico Health Districts.
Long also noted flu case numbers are already higher this year than last. So far this flu season, Virginia has spent 11 weeks at high spread flu activity, and the most recent update shows Virginia at regional spread — which is just one step below high spread.
Kids no longer wearing masks in schools could be one reason flu cases are expected to jump, but Long also said some other things at play are how many people get vaccinated, as well as how often people participate in behaviors, like staying home when they're sick or washing their hands or avoiding large crowds.
"We want to just encourage and remind people that the vaccines are safe and incredibly helpful in preventing illness," McKenna explained. "I think there's lots of reasons that people are just generally fatigued these days. I think for the kids, what I've been seeing from families is that this swing back into in-person school, which was so critical and we're so excited about, left a lot of families needing to come in, get lots of vaccines, get kids caught up, get paperwork done. And so I think it may be off people's radar."
With new COVID-19 booster shots available, health experts also said it’s safe to get both your booster and flu vaccine together.
"There isn't any data that we've seen that getting both the both of the vaccines will like double your side effects," said Long. "If you do end up getting side effects, and the side effects that we see for getting both at the same time is similar to what we see for getting each of those vaccines individually. Some people have a sore arm, some people feel a little fatigued or feel like they have a cold for a few hours, and some people don't feel anything."
Especially with COVID-19 still present in our communities, McKenna suggested getting your child a flu shot and also a COVID vaccine can help prevent them from ending up in the emergency room.
"Every now and then we have a particularly aggressive flu strain, that can really make even healthy kids incredibly sick," McKenna explained. "In emergency rooms, we can see kids admitted to ICUs. We can see kids having complications of any system you want to name. We've seen brain complications, we've seen heart complications, we've seen kids get really sick in their lungs and need ventilators. And so what we're doing with a vaccine is really trying to at least prevent those worst case scenarios."
Last flu season in Virginia, 62% of kids and 54% of adults were vaccinated against the flu.
Starting next Wednesday, Oct. 12, the RHHD will start offering free flu shots at all of their locations.
