Flu Shot May Protect Against Severe Effects Of COVID-19: Study

The annual influenza vaccine may reduce the risk of stroke, sepsis, blood clots and several other severe effects in patients with COVID-19, according to the largest study of its kind. The researchers from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, US, also found that patients with COVID-19 who had been vaccinated against the flu were significantly less likely to visit the emergency department (ED) and be admitted to the intensive care unit.

"Only a small fraction of the world has been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to date, and with all the devastation that has occurred due to the pandemic, the global community still needs to find solutions to reduce morbidity and mortality," said senior study author Devinder Singh, professor at the Miller School. "My team has been able to observe an association between the flu vaccine and reduced morbidity in COVID-19 patients," said Singh, who conducted the study with lead authors Susan Taghioff and Benjamin Slavin.

The study, published in the journal PLoS One on August 3, analysed patient records from a number of countries, including the US, the UK, Germany, Italy, Israel and Singapore. The researchers screened de-identified electronic health records on the TriNetX research database for more than 70 million patients to identify two groups of 37,377 patients.

Members of the first study group had received the flu vaccine two weeks and six months prior to being diagnosed with COVID-19. Those in the second group also had a positive COVID-19 diagnosis but were not vaccinated against the flu.

(PTI)