Not only risk groups vaccinate medics recommends flu vaccination for everyone

Curb disease: All should be vaccinated against the flu

Most health experts advise especially vulnerable people such as the elderly, the chronically ill as well as pregnant women to be vaccinated against the flu. A doctor now thinks that best of all should receive the vaccine. This would help stem a disease that "keeps us most in check in the western latitudes".

Serious illness is often downplayed

A flu infection is often confused with the real flu and therefore downplayed. But influenza is a serious disease, urges virologist Prof. Dr. med. Stephan Ludwig, Director of the Institute of Molecular Virology at the University Hospital Münster (UKM). Protection is provided by a vaccine, which will be available to all insured persons as a so-called quadruple vaccine for the first time this year.

According to a doctor, not only people from risk groups, but all people should be vaccinated against the flu. (Image: sharryfoto / fotolia.com)

Too few people in Germany can be vaccinated

According to health experts, too few people in Germany can be vaccinated against influenza: According to a statement by the UKM, only 30 to 40 percent of the population.

However, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends a quota of 65 to 70 percent.

"This is the only way to ensure herd immunity and to prevent a flu epidemic in the best possible way", says Prof. Dr. med. Stephan Ludwig, coordinator of the nationwide FluResearchNet.

According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), over 1,600 people died of influenza last winter, and the number of unreported cases was probably much greater.

The number of 334,000 confirmed cases was 65 percent higher than in the previous year.

Flu vaccine for everyone

Therefore, the virologist answers to the question of who should be vaccinated: "Best of all! We need convict-takers to curb the disease that keeps us most at bay in the western latitudes. "

However, the vaccination recommendation is especially for the chronically ill, people over 60 years and pregnant women. In addition to these high-risk groups, medical personnel should also protect themselves through vaccination - and this every year.

"A universal vaccine that protects for ten or fifteen years does not yet exist, even if it has been researched for decades," says Ludwig.

"It can always be a different or even new pathogen prevail than was predicted, and then the steadily vaccinated protects a cross-reactivity of the immune system based on existing substances from previous vaccinations."

Starting this season, a quadruple vaccine will be paid

However, the doctor does not want to conceal that the flu vaccine - solitary considered - helped only conditionally in the past season.

"The expert prognosis of which pathogens are currently active in the world was wrong last winter," explains Ludwig.

The basis for the annual assumptions are two A- and two B-types of the influenza virus, which circulate again and again differently in the world.

So far, three of the expected virus variants were included in the standard vaccine, but a quadruple substance was not reimbursed by the health insurances.

In addition, insufficient quadruple vaccine was available for broad coverage last season after the prognosis was corrected.

"That's what STIKO, the Standing Vaccination Commission, has responded to. This year, everyone receives the high-quality vaccine and the manufacturers were able to produce accordingly, "explains Ludwig.

Complete vaccine protection after two weeks

According to experts, the best time for a vaccine is right now, in the fall. If you are currently unable to get vaccinated for health reasons, a vaccination in November or December makes sense.

"According to experience, the flu runs in two waves and so it is at least for the second wave, which was the way the last winter by the way, the stronger, protected," said Ludwig.

The vaccination is possible at the family doctor, the costs are borne by the health insurance. According to the information, the vaccine protection is fully available after two weeks. (Ad)