Australia has recorded 221,853 flu infections so far in 2017, more than any other year. As the flu season comes to an end, we’re beginning to understand why it was so bad. And it wasn’t because of increased, or more sensitive, testing.
A better vaccine could have reduced the rates, but not the high-dose Fluzone vaccine doctors were touting at the start of the week.
Flu vaccination doesn’t produce the same degree of immunity to flu viruses that wild infection does. But vaccine protection is much safer than getting the flu, and vaccination cannot give you the flu.