Good morning, my name is Dr. Sophia Tolliver and I am an assistant clinical professor at The Ohio
State University's department of family medicine here at the Wexner Medical Center and today
you are tuning in to flu myths debunked, everything you wanted to know
but were afraid to ask about getting your annual flu vaccination. So as you can see,
we are still in the midst of the pandemic and I am broadcasting live from my kitchen,
no lie from my kitchen, so sit back, relax, we're gonna go through some of the most commonly thought
myths about getting the flu vaccination. I was at the OSU healthy community day this past weekend
and I got my flu shot and I hope that you are considering to get your flu shot as well.
So again my name is Dr. Sophia Tolliver, i'm an assistant clinical professor
in the department of family medicine here at Ohio State. I'm also the wellness faculty lead
and today they've given me the great privilege of coming to you
live to talk about the flu vaccination. So let's get started, but before we get started,
if you want to ask some questions feel free to put them in the chat box. I will try to
answer some of those questions at the end. If we don't get to your question we will save them for
an additional event or the subsequent event, the next Facebook Live. Okay so let's get to it here.
Okay, so number one, one of the most common most frequently asked
questions about the annual flu shot and you know, it still kind of boggles my mind today that I
still get this question, but it's very popular, and so the number one of the number one myths that
I hear from my patients, friends and family really is you can catch the flu from the vaccination,
you can catch the flu virus from the flu shot and I'm here to debunk that myth today.
You cannot catch the flu from getting your annual vaccination. The flu shot is made from
parts and pieces of the actual virus and so when you get the flu shot,
your body is triggered into an immune response so that the next time that you encounter the real
virus it can say oh, I recognize this infection, I've already got the tools to fight it. And so
again, there is no way you can catch the flu from the annual flu vaccination. Additionally,
it takes the flu shot a couple weeks to actually kick in so chances are if you get the flu
after getting your annual flu vaccination, you are already brewing an infection anyway.
And so it's again very important to not only get the flu shot, but get it early so that you
can start to to cover, you know this beginning of the flu season that we're getting into here.
Okay, what's next? I hear this a lot, and it's simply a myth: healthy people don't need to
be vaccinated. And I'm here to say that's a myth because even though we are absolutely, 100 percent
supportive of people with chronic health diseases like diabetes heart failure hypertension,
other conditions that aren't, that make your immune system not work as well as it could,
definitely you need the flu shot,but even if you're healthy, you're an healthy individual,
you need the flu shot too because there's still a chance you can get sick and everyone can
benefit from getting the flu shot. Let's see here, and just to kind of piggyback on that,
everyone six months and older including, pregnant women are, per the CDC guidelines,
supposed to get the flu shot and we recommend that you get the flu shot.
Okay, what is another myth that we hear all the time?So if I get the flu shot, I don't
need to do anything else because i'm covered, right? There's nothing else that I need to do.
Well, we wish that were true. Of course getting the flu shot during the flu season is one of the
best things that you can do to help prevent the flu, but getting the flu shot is not a hundred
percent silver bullet, meaning the strains that are covered within that flu vaccination
don't always match the virus that's circulating in the community. But it has been proven
that you getting the flu shot, even if it doesn't cover that specific virus in the community
that's floating around that you might come into contact to, it can help to decrease the severity
of illness and the duration of illness. Okay, so additionally, in addition to getting the flu shot,
washing your hands making, sure that you're covering your cough or your sneeze, these are
things that additionally can help to decrease the spread of the flu and also help you to prevent
getting the flu. Okay so there are things aside from just getting the flu shot that you can do
to protect not only yourself, but your family and also for those individuals who might say,
well, I'm healthy you know, I don't need the flu shot, think about again your friends, your family
those individuals that you might come into contact with who do have chronic underlying diseases that
if they were to get the flu it would not be a good thing. They would have severe symptoms or symptoms
potentially would progress to where they would need to go to the ED or need to follow up with
a doctor. Think about those around you that you can protect just by getting the flu shot. Okay,
here's another myth that we hear often: if i have the flu, why can't I just take an antibiotic?
Well the influenza virus is just that, it's a virus, and antibiotics do not treat viruses.
Now you can think about also if someone who got the flu virus were to
get really sick, were to need hospitalization, sometimes the symptoms could get so
bad that other infections present themselves. For example, pneumonias,
different pneumonias that can affect that individual on top of the flu virus that are
driven by different bacterias and in that those cases you might need an antibiotic, but that's a
super infection, a superimposed infection on top of the flu virus, so you would not treat the flu
virus with antibiotics. But if the symptoms get worse enough or serious enough or severe enough
in a hospital setting, in an inpatient setting, there might be a need for antibiotics. Okay,
next myth: the flu is just a bad cold. The flu is just a bad cold. So the flu, you get symptoms
that can be similar to cold symptoms and a lot of the symptoms can overlap, for example,
the sore throat, the runny nose, sneezing, hoarseness, cough, but it's important if you
have questions to talk to your doctor especially if you're having fevers in addition to the cough
and respiratory symptoms, difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, very important that
you begin to understand some of the fine differences between the flu in the common cold.
Okay, the common cold lasts anywhere from seven to ten days and usually is pretty mild symptoms. You
can have a cough, but the flu a lot of times we're seeing fevers, chills, we're seeing body aches,
so it's it's important to kind of make that just that that distinguish to distinguish those two.
Okay, another myth: you can't spread the flu if you're feeling
well. Well, actually 20 to 30 percent of people carrying the influenza virus have
no symptoms, so again, asymptomatic transmission of the flu virus, where have we heard that before?
We are in a pandemic with COVID-19 where we also have asymptomatic transmission
of a virus, and so as it relates to the flu virus. again, getting your annual flu vaccination
is going to be very important in helping to stop the spread and especially in this flu season where
we're not only dealing with the flu but we're dealing with COVID-19. We don't want to see
surging numbers of the flu condition and we're continuing to fight COVID-19 to prevent surge
conditions and so as we begin to fight both of those, that our goal ultimately is to
help decrease the burden on the health care system. We want to make sure that
those who have the worst symptoms can get COVID-19 testing and treatment and resources,
and that we can prevent the flu from being an additional problem in this pandemic season.
Okay, here's another myth: you don't need to get the flu shot every year. Yes,
you do need to get the flu shot every year because the coverage is only about five or six months,
about the time frame of a flu season. So if you're depending on last year's flu shot to cover this
year's flu season, I have to let you know, get your new flu shot, okay? Get a new vaccination.
Okay, here's another one: chicken soup will speed your recovery from the flu. So, hot liquids have
been known to help ease a sore throat and actually provide some much needed fluids,
but there is no evidence that chicken soup is going to prevent the flu or treat the flu. Okay,
so we are right at 13 minutes here, let's see if there are any questions in the chat function
that I can see here. Let's see, I'm having some trouble looking at my chat function here,
but if you do have any questions that we can't get to this time we will save those questions for the
next Facebook Live. It's been my pleasure to be with you today to help debunk myths associated
with the flu. Thank you for all that you're doing, we're in this together. Remember to wear a mask,
wash your hands, cover your cough and sneeze and give each other six feet. Okay,
we're all in this together - have a good one.