Friday's Health Report: Common misconceptions about flu and COVID vaccines
BATON ROUGE — There is a lot of misinformation about flu and covid-19 vaccines, and that may make people hesitant to get the shots.
A common misconception is that the flu or COVID-19 vaccines can make you sick.
"You aren't going to get the flu from the flu vaccine. You're not going to get COVID from the COVID vaccine. It may feel momentarily like you're coming down with something, but it's going to resolve without any treatment," Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Robert Jacobson said.
Some may worry about supply issues. Dr. Jacobson says, while that may have been the case when the COVID-19 vaccine was first rolled out, it's not anymore.
"We have three manufacturers in this country making COVID vaccines that are licensed or approved for use by the FDA, and monitored and recommended by the ACIP. Pharmacies, healthcare organizations and public health have the vaccines available for you. That's not an excuse," he said.
Finally, some may believe they don't need vaccination because they had a recent infection. However, Dr. Jacobson explains why you can't rely on natural immunity alone.
"And not everybody who even has a good immune system gets three months protection out of it," he said.