This year’s flu vaccine is a quadrivalent, with four strains of vaccines instead of the usual three.
Cindy Ruma, Immunization Coordinator for the VNA, says the vaccine will have two A and two B flu strains.
Ruma says that’s important because two years ago, Nebraska got hit hard with a flu outbreak after Christmas.
One particular B strain of influenza was not in the flu vaccine that year. Ruma says people have two choices when getting vaccinated, either the flu shot or the flu mist.
Both protect against the same strains and both take two weeks to be fully effective.
"Really I try to encourage people to get their shots by about two weeks before Thanksgiving because once you start going to those family gatherings where there are people you haven’t been around or shared many germs with, and just a lot of people in closed in spaces, that’s a good time to have it, a good two weeks before then.”
Ruma says the flu mist is a little cheaper than the flu shot this year.
Anyone over six months old may be vaccinated, but for kids ages 8-16, the flu mist has been proven to be more effective.
The peak of the flu season is mid-December to mid-February.