The flu outbreak puts millions of people at risk every year. This year’s flu outbreak has been deemed to be the worst of the decade. One of the reasons behind this is the unfortunate failure of this year’s flu vaccine. This vaccine is said to be only 25% effective against the most often identified virus of this flu season. According to the experts, time and money can solve this issue hopefully before the next flu outbreak. Drug companies have already gotten their best teams on creating a more effective flu vaccine for the upcoming year.
In any given flu season, flu shots are said to be effective anywhere between sixty to forty percent. However, this year, the mark fell way below that, causing many people to fall victim to the flu in spite of getting the flu shot. Every year the drug companies try to come up with a better vaccine similar to the measles inoculation. The flu shot is targeted at a couple of the commonly seen strains of flu, making people vulnerable to the other strains of flu. The ideal flu shot needs to be able to protect people against at least 90% of the flu strains out there.
Since the flu virus is always mutating, it makes it difficult to come up with a single flu shot that works for all strains. There are hundreds of different viruses and vaccines can protect humans for only a couple of these viruses. However, the current flu outbreak has put a lot of attention on the importance of coming up with a flu shot that is effective and will last a lifetime as well. Many drug companies like Sanofi are trying their best to deal with the situation. In fact, Sanofi has even signed a deal with SK Chemicals Co that is related to developing a universal vaccine against different flu strains.
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