Worried About the Flu Shot Let's Separate Fact From Fiction

"Every year before influenza itself arrives to circulate, misinformation and misconceptions about the flu vaccine begin circulating. Some of these contain a grain of truth but end up distorted, like a whispered secret in the Telephone game."

"But if you're looking for an excuse not to get the flu vaccine, last year's numbers of its effectiveness would seem a convincing argument on their own. By all measures, last season's flu vaccine flopped, clocking in at about 23 percent effectiveness in preventing lab-confirmed influenza infections."

"But that's not the whole story, said Lisa Grohskopf, a medical officer in the influenza division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."

"'Twenty-three is better than zero, but the 23 percent was overall. If you were one of the people who got an influenza B strain, it was closer to 60 percent,' she said. 'Even if it's not going to work against one virus very well, there are other viruses circulating.'"