While Waiting For a Vaccine…Get Your Vaccine!

Five minutes in line at our local drugstore. Totally free thanks to our insurance plan. A needle inserts into the Deltoid muscle of our arms.  The syringe brings a gift that so many of us take for granted. A flu shot, aka the influenza vaccine. This year I take nothing for granted. Certainly not the gift of immunity to a deadly disease.

Yesterday both Adi and myself went to CVS, and in under 10 minutes we each received our annual flu shot. Although I generally avoid sharing the same indoor space as others, when necessary, it can be done safely by following the same protocols as my hospital, and wearing both:

1. 1. A mask (no need for an N95)
   2. A face shield

Background

The flu shot has been around for many decades. People have been reaping the bounties of its lifesaving effects since the 1930s, and I can only assume some have been refusing it for as long as people have had the ability to make their own poorly informed decisions. The frustrating thing about influenza is that it mutates each year, which is why you can get the flu 2 years in a row. The good news is that scientists can predict many of these variations each year, and more often than not provide adequate protection. In 2009, a completely new strain of influenza came along, called H1N1, and the world freaked out. But these same clever scientists figured it out, and they simply incorporated the vaccine for that into our annual flu shot. So your annual flu shot is also now an annual H1N1 shot. It’s that easy. 

Even Partial Immunity is Great

I learned the easy way that even when it does not prevent you from getting the flu, it likely makes it significantly less severe if you do catch it. 2 years ago it was Purim morning and I felt kind of lousy. So I went into my doctor’s office last minute, he ran tests and I took some basic cold medicine. I felt fine by the afternoon, like a mildly annoying cold. Later that week my doctor called me to ask how I’m feeling. “I’m fine thank you, I was feeling much better a few hours later” I told him. He said, “Great, because you tested positive for Influenza! Good thing you got the flu shot or it would have been much, much worse!”

Wait Until Early October For Ideal Timing

It’s true, we got it yesterday, but that does not necessarily mean that getting it now is the best timing. There is a bit of guesswork involved when deciding when to get your flu shot. The vaccine takes about 2 weeks to take effect in your system. It takes 4 weeks for full effect. So that’s a month after getting it when you’ll start to have your best immunity. The vaccine offers protection for about 6 months, but it is the most effective during the first 3 months. So as you can see there is some level of guessing when to get it, since the worst part of flu season is often between December and March. So thus the CDC always recommends October for adults, but earlier if it is a children’s dose, because they need to get 2 doses 4 weeks apart so thus have to start sooner. (With my 2018 Purim example, the holiday was on the morning of March 1 that year, and I got the flu shot a full 6 months prior, so it was still very highly effective even 6 months later!)

Especially During the Pandemic

This year you might be considering skipping it. You might be thinking to yourself, enough people are masking and washing their hands, it will actually be a better flu season than usual. And that’s probably true; it will likely have far less of a reach this year, thanks to the same things we are doing to protect ourselves from COVID-19. (Huge twist, washing your hands, wearing masks and social distancing prevents you from getting all sorts of viruses, not just COVID.) But, here is why you should want to get it all the more this year. If you get sick, you will have no idea why you’re sick. You’ll need to go to the doctor or the hospital, and get tested for COVID, and those are resources that you simply do not want to use this year unless you need to. You want to avoid the hospital for your own safety, and because resources at hospitals are all the more precious. If you can prevent yourself from either getting the flu in the first place, or at least ensuring your flu will be less severe, isn’t that worth 10 minutes of your time, and maybe a 40 dollar copay? (I checked, if you have no insurance, that’s how much it costs at CVS.)

Let’s nip this flu season in the bud, vaccinate ourselves, our kids, and our loved ones, and look forward to the new year when these same brilliant scientists have successfully come up with vaccines for COVID too. Just like the flu shot, it won’t be perfect, and each year they will likely concoct a better version; but the more of us who get it, the sooner this damn pandemic will come to an end, and I can get back into the movie theaters, where I belong.

For information about the annual flu shot, including timing recommendations read the CDC info here.

Boaz Hepner grew up in LA in Pico/Robertson and now lives here with his wife and baby girl. Thus, the neighborhood is very important to him. He helped clean up the area by adding the dozens of trash cans that can still be seen from Roxbury to La Cienega. When he is not working as Registered Nurse in Santa Monica, he can be found with his wife and daughter enjoying his passions: his multitude of friends, movies, poker and traveling.