Prevention of influenza: the most effective means of protection

The flu is much easier to avoid than after it is long and difficult to treat. Therefore, it is necessary to take care of the prevention of influenza. Many people think that preventing a flu is simply not communicating with a sick person and wearing an antiviral mask. But this is not so. There are three types of influenza prevention. Want to know which ones?

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Three types of influenza prevention

• Antiviral prophylaxis of influenza through vaccine. Of these, there is specific prevention and vaccine prevention
• Another type of prevention is chemoprophylaxis with antiviral means of protection against influenza (drugs, vitamins)
• The third type of prevention against influenza is observance of personal hygiene (wearing a medical mask, washing hands and so on).

Prevention of influenza with a vaccine

This is the basis of protection against all kinds of influenza. The vaccine is one of the most reliable means to prevent the incidence of influenza, especially during epidemics. The immune system, which is significantly strengthened after vaccination, can cope with any disease of the common cold. What to say - vaccination helped to cope with monsters that mowed entire cities: diphtheria, measles, poliomyelitis, tetanus.

Today, when the world is threatened by the flu, and scientists every year talk about its possible epidemics, vaccination will help to cope with influenza viruses. The task of the vaccine is not to eliminate the disease as such, but to reduce the opportunity to suffer from it. Especially dangerous complications after the flu, against which the vaccine is also a good helper. These complications primarily affect the functioning of the cardiovascular system, respiratory organs, blood, kidney and liver.

Who needs to be vaccinated?

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends vaccination against the flu from October to December. Especially it is necessary to do this for those who are at risk: small children from six months to 15 years, employees of places of mass use, elderly people over 49 years old and those who suffer from chronic diseases. Still at risk are pregnant women, but they need to do the vaccine only on the recommendation of a doctor and after the first trimester of pregnancy.

The flu - its types - also differ from each other. If you exclude different types of "animal" influenza, that is, pork, chicken and so on, then the flu is divided into seasonal (when sick mainly in winter) and usual - throughout the whole year. Ordinary influenza is a disease of younger people and children, so it is very important to vaccinate in kindergartens, schools, secondary and higher educational institutions and barracks.

After mass vaccination	Reduction in the incidence rate by%
Cases of treatment in the hospital of the elderly	48%
Lethal cases among the elderly	55-68%
Cases of influenza infection of healthy people under the age of 65 years	75-90%
Cases of Influenza Infection in Children after Vaccination	62-90%
Acute otitis in school children	31-36%

How effective is the flu vaccine?

Many are important side effects after vaccination and most importantly - how much it reduces the likelihood of the incidence of influenza. For more than six decades, doctors have been using influenza vaccines - the main prevention of influenza. It happens that the hospital receives reports of side effects after vaccination against the flu, but they are very rare and probably due to intolerance to certain substances in the vaccine.

Read also: Vaccination against influenza: 12 most popular myths

Adverse reactions of the body, which doctors usually warn before vaccination, can be influenza-like symptoms. This is a muscle or headache, fever is not above 37.5 degrees, redness or a slight swelling at the site of the injection. All these symptoms are rather poorly expressed and usually pass for a day or two. According to statistics, complex complications after vaccination against influenza occur only in 1 person out of a million, so do not be afraid to get vaccinated.

If you want the vaccine to not cause you any health problems, you should notify the doctor about all the diseases that you suffered a month before the vaccination. And also about allergies to any drugs, especially the protein of a chicken egg, on the basis of which most vaccines are made. The vaccine can not be administered to people who:

• Ever had an allergy to a hen's egg protein - a constituent of the vaccine
• They ached or are ill now with cold or chronic diseases in the stage of exacerbation
• Had allergies to vaccinations in other years
• Patients with fever and pain of any origin
• Children up to six months old
• Pregnant women in the first trimester

Whatever it was, the protective properties of vaccination far exceed those risks that may arise from its introduction. For example, the number of hospitalizations with influenza and the number of complications are significantly reduced, as well as the number of deaths due to influenza.

Compliance with personal hygiene

Prevention of influenza also consists in the observance of personal hygiene. It is very important to wash your hands often, handle as often as possible the surface of furniture in the house and stay away from people who have become ill with the flu. In extreme cases - to wear a medical mask. But only change it every three hours, otherwise viruses and bacteria attack you even more, having accumulated on this mask.

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How is the flu transmitted?

The flu spreads from person to person by airborne droplets, that is, through sneezing, cough, and also through handshakes. When sneezing and coughing, droplets of saliva scatter within a radius of two meters and infect everything around. The influenza virus enters the human body through the respiratory tract and settles on the mucous membranes of the throat and nasal passages. Then it is introduced into the cells of the body and forces them to produce similar viruses, and the cell itself dies.

At this time, the human body is saturated with toxins - the products of the vital activity of viruses. From this a man's body aches, his head aches, the muscles of the whole body. The person becomes irritable, he has an increased weakness, he may not get enough sleep, the temperature rises significantly. All this - the symptoms of the flu, which take place for one to two weeks. If you care about the prevention of influenza, then it is important for you to know what is most contagious for a sick person during the first three days, and for babies - two to three times as long - from seven to 10 days.

How much does the influenza virus live?

Those who care about such an event as the prevention of influenza, it is useful to know that on surfaces that are not disinfected, the virus lives from two to eight hours. And then he dies. But the temperature for his death is quite high - up to 100 degrees, that is, the boiling point. Therefore, it is desirable to wash the stuff of a sick person and your own during the flu period in very hot water. To kill the virus are well suited bactericidal agents - alcohol, iodine, soap (alkaline). Hydrogen peroxide is also very good.

Now many drugstores and supermarkets sell bactericidal products for the treatment of hands and surfaces. It is very good to take them with you where you can not always wash your hands. For example, on business trips. And the flu virus will be defeated by your simplest efforts.

So, to avoid complications due to the flu and the flu itself, it is very important not to sit idly by. Prevention of influenza can significantly reduce the risks of getting sick and save time that you would spend on treatment.