|This Fall Protect Yourself and Your Family: Get a Flu Shot Each
winter, millions of people suffer from the fever, aches, and
pains caused by the flu, a highly contagious infection. A
relatively mild disease in healthy young and middle-aged people,
flu can be life threatening to older adults. In an average year,
flu leads to more than 200,000 hospitalizations and about 36,000
One of the best ways to prevent flu is to get a flu shot each
fall. Getting the shot every year is important because the flu
virus is slightly different each year, and the flu shot is
updated. The best time to get the shot is during October and
November — before flu season begins. Even though itís effective
and covered by Medicare, most older Hispanics donít get a yearly
flu shot. In fact, according to the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, only about 48 percent of Hispanics get the
vaccine compared to 69 percent of non-Hispanic whites. Many
worry about safety. You canít get the flu from a flu shot! In
most people, the flu shot