Millennials Not Alone in Dodging Flu Shots

We told you recently that fewer than half the patients in the “millennials” age group (roughly, those born between 1982 and 2004) are planning to get a flu shot this year—in spite of the fact that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is urging patients in general to get vaccinated earlier than ever. Now a study by UPI indicates that U.S. parents who don’t get their kids immunized make that choice because they simply don’t think flu shots are necessary. Others say they’re afraid of possible side effects, or that they just plain forgot. These results, published in the American Journal of Infection Control this month, fly in the face of some pretty grim statistics: Last flu season 970,000 people were hospitalized due to influenza (out of an estimated 40 million cases overall, according to the CDC). Children 0 to 4 years of age had the second highest hospitalization rate for flu (55.4 per 100,000), and at least 128 children died from flu in the 2014–2015 season. Urgent care providers might want to have these data top-of-mind when suggesting flu shots to parents.