BARNSTABLE – The Center for Disease Control has determined that this season’s flu vaccine is only proving to be 50 percent effective against the flu virus.
Officials say that is because the virus has changed and it is too late to make a new vaccine. The change was found after a committee had already chosen which viruses to include in this year’s vaccine.
George Heufelder, Director of the Barnstable County Department of Health and the Environment, said it is still important to get a flu shot. A shot, he said, will still protect people who are vaccinated against some of the severe symptoms of the flu.
Heufelder said the number of flu cases has been low in Barnstable County so far and they have not seen a peak yet.
