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.
Influenza seems reluctant to release its grip on the United States, as most measures of flu activity showed little change last week, according to today's update from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
This flu season's vaccine has provided "little or no protection" against influenza in Canada because of a mismatch between the H3N2 strain included in the vaccine and the predominant circulating H3N2 strain, say interim findings from the Canadian Sentinel Physician Surveillance Network (SPSN) published in today's issue of Eurosurveillance.
Tuberculosis cases decreased by 6% during 2012 in 29 European countries, while hot spots in northern Europe and the Baltic states remained, according to a report issued today by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)
Some measures of influenza activity in the United States decreased last week, but 19 flu-related deaths in children were reported, far higher than any previous week of the season, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in today's weekly update.
Vaccine effectiveness is well below the typical season average, which is around 60%.
Chickens on two more farms in British Columbia have been infected with H5N2 avian influenza, bringing the total to 10 and the number of birds dead or scheduled for culling to nearly 234,000 since the outbreak's start just 2 weeks ago, say news sources and official reports.
Though still below epidemic thresholds, US influenza activity has begun to pick up, and the vaccine mismatch with circulating H3N2 strains has reached two-thirds, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today in its weekly update.
In addition, two more children died from flu.
Despite the incomplete uptake and moderate effectiveness of the seasonal influenza vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that vaccination prevented more than 7 million illnesses and about 90,000 hospitalizations during the 2013-14 flu season.
