While some are still concerned over the possibility of an Ebola outbreak in the United States, the country is facing a more sinister health problem that should be acted upon quickly: the flu.
It's the flu season in the United States, and the virus has never been this active. In San Diego County, more than 600 had already been confirmed to have the flu, almost twice the number of cases last year around the same time. Although there's no reported death, more are coming for hospital visits. The infection already makes up almost 10% of ER visits as of this month.
In Minnesota, over 570 people had already been hospitalized even at this very early stage of the flu season-a huge jump from around 380 cases last year.
When you take into account the other states, however, the number is grimmer. More than 12 people had already died from the virus. Two of them are from Minnesota. The most number of deaths, 3, has been recorded in Texas. Worse, at this early, it has already become an epidemic after the number of deaths attributable to pneumonia and flu has already breached the threshold of 6.8%.
For this reason, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends everyone to take the flu shot. However, there's a problem. The virus that dominates this season is the H3N2 strain, which is very potent yet the vaccines available are not strong enough to help people build immunity against it. In other words, the vaccine cannot guarantee sufficient protection against the flu.
One of the reasons is mutation. It's normal for viruses to mutate and that scientists do keep track of their developments so they too can modify the vaccines. What's different in this flu season case is that by the time they discovered the mutation, they no longer had the time to change the vaccines. Moreover, it takes around 14 days before the body develops the antibodies against the virus.