As US battles COVID-19, flu shot misinformation spreads

One false claim circulating on Facebook and Instagram said a flu shot would raise the probability of COVID-19 infection by 36%

US health officials are pushing Americans to get vaccinated against the u to help prevent hospitals already busy battling COVID-19 from being overwhelmed this winter, but false claims are threatening their efforts.

Misinformation on social media, particularly that a u shot will increase the risk of contracting the coronavirus or cause you to test positive for COVID-19 -- it won’t -is undermining the public health message.

One false claim circulating on Facebook and Instagram said a u shot would raise the probability of COVID-19 infection by 36 percent. Another on Instagram said Sanofi’s u vaccine Fluzone was 2.4 times more deadly than COVID-19.

A national study from the University of Michigan found that one in three parents planned to skip the u vaccine for their children this year, with mothers and fathers pointing to misinformation, including the belief that it is not effective, as a reason.

“Primary care providers have a really important role to play in this flu season,” said Sarah Clark, research scientist at the Michigan Medicine Child Health Evaluation and Research Center, who led the study.

“They need to send parents a clear and strong message about the importance of

u vaccine.” But with daily COVID-19 infections rising to record levels in several US states, false information remains a barrier to people getting vaccinated.

Jeanine Guidry, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University who studies health messaging on social media, said: “There is so much misinformation related to Covid and I really believe that that spills over” to the u.

Amelia Jamison, a misinformation researcher and doctoral student at Johns Hopkins

University, agreed.

“Flu is getting caught up in some of the narratives we see about coronavirus,” she said.

- Vaccination hobbled in 2020 - According to the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC), only 49.2 percent of people got a u vaccine during the 2018-19 season.

Aside from misinformation, measures aimed at curbing the spread of COVID-19 resulted in fewer in-person preventive medical visits, during which many receive the vaccine. And other u shot clinics typically offered by employers, churches or schools have been on hold.

High unemployment due to the economic fallout of the pandemic has also left millions of Americans without health insurance, meaning states will need to pick up the vaccine cost for more patients.

While the effectiveness of the u shot can vary depending on whether the strain of

u circulating in communities matches the strain in the vaccine, the CDC said it prevents millions of illnesses each year.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends the vaccine for all children over the age of six months.