Republican and Democratic lawmakers who head a House oversight and investigations subcommittee yesterday sent letters to five federal health officials asking how lessons learned from this flu season—with its flu vaccine mismatched to the main circulating strain—could be used to improve the nation's flu preparedness in time for the next season.
Nineteen new H7N9 avian influenza cases have been reported in seven of China's provinces over the past 3 days, though basic epidemiologic details are known for only six of them, according to official reports, including health department notices translated and posted by FluTrackers, an infectious disease news message board.
The change of 2 strains was expected but was not without considerable discussion.
The latest estimate of the overall effectiveness of this year's seasonal influenza vaccine puts it at just 19% (95% confidence interval [CI], 7%-29%), slightly lower than the 23% reported in mid-January, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported yesterday.
Faced with new data, the ACIP drops its preference for nasal-spray flu vaccine in 2- to 8-year-olds.
The World Health Organization (WHO) today recommended changing two of the three strains in trivalent flu vaccines for use in the Northern Hemisphere's 2015-16 flu season.
A Scottish study of this year's vaccine found effectiviness of 33%, higher than elsewhere.
An additional case of H7N9 avian flu in China's Guangdong province has been reported to Hong Kong's Centre for Health Protection (CHP), according to a machine-translated statement posted today by FluTrackers, an infectious disease news message board.
A study based on data from more than 2 million Medicare beneficiaries suggests that the high-dose influenza vaccine works better than a standard-dose vaccine for preventing probable flu illness and flu-related hospital admissions in elderly people.
Researchers in both places found vaccine effectiveness to be well below the already-low US numbers.
