2019/2020 Influenza

The influenza has had especially detrimental effects in this particular flu season due to the shortcomings of the strain predictions that scientists made in the spring to prepare for the upcoming flu season. Influenza is an enveloped RNA virus with lipid membrane receptors neuraminidase and hemagglutinin. Because the flu is a segmented virus, meaning that its RNA genome is segmented with a high mutation rate, the flu has high genetic drift and genetic shift, one of its most meaningful virulence factors. This is the primary reason why a new vaccine must be created every year and why the vaccine created many not be accurate once months of mutation has occurred. This year in particular, we have seen a low percentage of effectiveness of the flu vaccine. However, in comparison to the highest prevalence years in the past, 2019/2020 does not seem to be record-breaking.

This year, Influenza B/Victoria has been the most prevalent, and the director of the National Institute of Allery and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, has even said that this year’s immunization is “not an awful match, but it’s not a very good match.” The CDC released data that this year’s vaccine is a 58% match for the B/Victoria strain. Although this is the most prevalent strain, the more harmful strain, H1N1 is a “very good match” for this year’s vaccine. This information proves that although getting the flu shot does not mean that there is a 0% chance of you or your child getting the flu, there is a much higher chance that getting the vaccine will decrease the life-threatening symptoms and harm of the flu. For some other strains like the H3N2, this year’s flu vaccination is only 32% effective. However, this strain is much less prevalent. Therefore, the effects of the lack of effectiveness have not been felt.

From this year’s flu, the CDC estimates already there have been 210,000-370,000 hospitalizations and 12,000-30,000 deaths. These deaths are usually found in populations that are already immunocompromised, the elderly and children, or infants why have not developed a full immune system. Something that I found most interesting in doing this research was that there are scientists working to create a universal flu shot that individuals would only have to receive once in their lifetime. They are working on targeting a part of the flu virus that does not mutate in order to kill all strains effectively despite mutation. So far, this vaccine would most likely take at least a decade to be developed and approved by the FDA. I believe that this could completely change the landscape of medicine especially pertaining to flu deaths. Before completing this blog post, I had no idea that the flu was so deadly and affected so many people outside of the week-long sickness I have seen in my family and friends.