**Flu vaccines don't match the main circulating flu virus strain, researchers find ** By Maggie Fox, CNN Updated 8:55 PM ET, Thu December 16, 2021
One of the main circulating influenza viruses has changed and the current flu vaccines don't match it well any more -- an indication they may not do much to prevent infection, researchers reported Thursday. But they are still likely to prevent severe illness. "From our lab-based studies it looks like a major mismatch," Scott Hensley, a professor of microbiology at the University of Pennsylvania who led the study, told CNN.
It's bad news for the vaccine, he said. Influenza vaccines protect against four different strains of the flu: H3N2, H1N1 and two strains of influenza B. Hensley's study only covers H3N2, but that happens to be the main circulating strain.
The vaccine mismatch may help explain an outbreak of flu at the University of Michigan last month that affected more than 700 people. More than 26% of those who tested positive had been vaccinated against flu -- the same percentage as those who tested negative. That indicates the vaccine was not effective in preventing infection.
It's what flu viruses do, Hensley said. "We have been monitoring this virus for several months," he said. Flu viruses mutate all the time—far more than other viruses, including the coronavirus. And different variations can circulate at the same time. But this version of H3N2 has changes that help it escape the antibodies the body makes in response to vaccines.
Antibodies are the first line of defense against invaders like viruses, and the current vaccine doesn't seem to generate any of the right antibodies against this new, mutated version of H3N2, called 2a2 for short. Luckily, the changes are unlikely to affect the second line of defense offered by immune system -- cells called T-cells, so even f the vaccines don't protect against infection, they are likely to protect people against severe disease and death, Hensley said.
"Studies have clearly shown that seasonal influenza vaccines consistently prevent hospitalizations and deaths even in years where there are large antigenic mismatches," Hensley and colleagues wrote in a report posted online as a pre-print. It's not published in a peer reviewed journal. "Influenza vaccinations will be crucial for reducing hospitalizations as SARS-CoV-2 and 2a2 H3N2 viruses co-circulate in the coming months."
https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/16/health/flu-vaccine-mismatch/index.html
REEEEAAAAALY
Please show me those studies. I've looked, I can't find studies that show anything like that, much less "clearly."
And the 2017 DoD study would Indicate they do nothing but may make things worse for those who take them
Come on let's get real here.
Every year flu shots replicate the previous flu as they do not have a new flu yet to make a shot. They have always said the flu shot is from last year but it will make the severity less of the flu this year. The flu has to become a real bacteria thing before they can create anything for it so of course the flu shot was always from the year before and this was never hidden and always talked about.
You must be too young to have ever needed a flu shot. But you can find this real easy in one little trip on Google.
Flu shots in the Northern Hemisphere are tweaked by what is circulating in the Southern Hemisphere during their winter, attempting to predict how influenza strains will mutate in the next 6 months. I don't know what they did this year, because they deny that there was a flu season at all. Some years the CDC claims a relatively good match between the vax and dominant strain, others not so much. However, this is very early for them to start admitting in MSM that they have a failed match---I think they'll use this info to pump up hysteria, along with Omicron & Delta.
News flash: those shots have been ineffective against both A/B flu strains for yrs now.
True---some years CDC will report greater % failure than others. However, their reports of ineffectiveness usually only come when more than halfway through the flu season (after a ton of people are sick). I think this may play into their upcoming narrative of an explosion of disease for the Christmas season.