To urge you to get your flu jab…

[sundriftwanderer]

i got flu over Christmas and it’s genuinely been the most poorly I’ve ever been. It hit me out of nowhere on Monday night and I’ve been so unwell. Night sweats, fevers, diarrhoea, the most horrendous cough, sinus congestion, a three day headache. I tested positive on Wednesday (I only tested because my dad had it), but I knew before that I had it.

Im at the point now where I slept until 11am today, had a bath at 7pm and I could go back to bed now and probably do another fifteen hours. It’s been horrendous. I’m hoping I’ve turned a bit of a corner, but I can’t imagine how it would be if I hadn’t been vaccinated.

My dad tested positive on Monday and had to have an ambulance today, thankfully he’s not gone in to hospital but he’s been asleep for pretty much five days now. He’s also vaccinated and I dread to think what would’ve happened if he wasn’t. I think we could’ve lost him.

It’s been awful. Please get your vaccine, it could’ve been a lot lot worse.

https://ukhsa.blog.gov.uk/2025/11/11/how-well-will-i-be-protected-from-flu-this-year-with-the-current-uk-influenza-vaccines/

Here are some facts about how effective this year's flu jab is.

They didn’t make a mistake. The strain they developed the vaccine for evolved.

There was plenty of availability September / October time.

When the numbers of cases are soaring, demand inevitably peaks causing the shortages we’ve been seeing recently. Get sorted earlier next year would be my advice.

I thought the seasonal flu jabs were not even released until October. It's not a case of "getting sorted earlier".

My friend has had this flu.

She has said she will get the vaccine from now on in.

I get because my ds carer and he has a neurological condition so he gets it for that.

Im so glad I’ve avoided the flu as I’ve heard even with the vaccine this years has been horrendous.

These posts are so helpful to those who don’t quite get it - my friend now does. Sadly she’s learned the hard way with being very ill for 3 weeks.

I had mine in the first week of September.

This. I got the vaccine in October. I still got the flu, in December. But it was relatively mild. It still was the flu, though, & knocked me out for a week.

It's what I was told by NHS staff. No idea how true it is - I'm not a scientist or healthcare professional. All I know is that it's the only year I've been floored since getting the flu jab.

I know strains evolve, but I also thought they had to pick a strain at the time of designing the flu jab, based on which one they thought was most likely to spread that season - so our absolute protection from the flu is a bit of a gamble. Last year, I was told the gamble was wrong.

Happy to be better informed by someone more in the know!

Yes, really. Everyone I know.

I'm obviously not including random people I bump into once a year as I don't "know" them. Everyone in my immediate circle of friends, family and coworkers.

I live in a big city though, so it's unsurprising we've all caught it. There's not exactly good ventilation and spacing out on the tube...

Me too! My surgery texted me the minute they got them in.

Getting the flu jab right has always been a gamble but the year it failed completely due to the virus they thought was dominant being the wrong one an extra 60k died over the year because it’s not just flu it’s the effect it has on the rest of the body. Can’t remember which year but pre covid.

I've never been able to find anything that comprehensively explains how being vaccinated for one flu strain offers protection (in the sense of reduced/lesser symptoms) for a strain NOT included in said vaccine? I realise there are a few strains included in the vaccine btw, it's moot though for the purposes of the question because I'm talking specifically about catching a strain not included.
I think it'd be a no brainer for us all to get the vaccine if it was made crystal clear that it provides x level of reduced severity in ALL strains of flu. My deduction though is that most people don't bother because the message is a very ambiguous one that protecting yourself from one type of infection 'may' make your system more resilient to secondary infections.
So when I see threads like this, my curious mind asks how - how is the vaccine making you less symptomatic of something you're not vaccinated against?

Look up cross-reactive immunity.

Getting a gamble wrong doesn't mean they made a mistake.
A gamble is chance. A mistake is doing something wrong.

This is nonsense. 20% to 30% of flu cases are mild or asymptomatic. It's really unhelpful to keep repeating this myth as it leads to people with flu not thinking they have it because they're not ill enough, then going round spreading it. Flu is simply being infected with one of the viruses grouped under that name. It's not the word for being very very ill.

I have, and as I said it's entirely ambiguous in relation to the flu vaccine.
Suggestions that it both successfully induces same and that it very rarely induces same (and indeed possibly blunts/hampers same).

I've had the jab and have lost 3 weeks of December and still not fully 100 percent now. Dread to think what it would be like if I hadn't had the flu jab in Oct.

I'm just repeating the language that was used - you seem to be taking this personally, so I apologise if I've offended. I didn't mean it in a negative way.

Gamble or mistake - or any other word - the flu jab doesn't always save you from the flu. You can get the jab and still get poorly.

I still get mine every year. The flu is awful, and the jab is a minor inconvenience. It's more than worth getting the jab, and I always encourage others to get it. I'm very grateful to the clever people who make it all possible.

Being vaccinated definitely improves the quality of my life.

How do you know that?

There is no parallel universe in which you never had the jab.

Even the authorities say its around 30% to 40% effective in not attending or being admitted to hospital.... so 60% to 70% that you'll end up there regardless.

I mean the mRNA doesn’t stay in your system, mRNA is apparently quite fragile and is cleared from the body quickly, in days to weeks. Yes you’re right, the vaccine primes your immune system to recognise and fight the virus if needed - so the immune response is much longer lasting but the actual vaccine doesn’t remain in the body .

Because of what I’ve been told by health professionals, because of what my dad was told by the paramedics yesterday.

Exact same as @HashtagShitShop had the vaccine and also all the symptoms you described OP and weeks of illness.

I think until unless you've ever actually had symptomatic real proper flu, it can be easily under estimated.
My friends Dad died aged 40 from flu. As far as I know he was a healthy 40yo. (We were young at the time).
Ive had flu several times in my 50 odd years and it truely does knock you. It usually comes on quick. Its never a bad cold that turns to flu.

Having had Covid 3 times, I'd choose COVID any time over flu.

There also seems to be some people carry flu. Can test pos and carry on as usual.
I try to get the jab but getting it privately isn't as easy as it used to be. I eventually managed to get a private jab beginning of Dec, alot later than usual.

Not RTFT but just chiming in to say I wish I'd paid for a flu jab this year. It absolutely clattered me and I was off work for a full week. Thankfully my toddler's symptoms were mild (though he's so full to the brim with nursery bugs I don't think it could fit in) but it was miserable.

DH is pretty ill right now. I’m hoping that I don’t get it as we’re going away next week 🤞 He’s in bed feeling very sorry for himself drinking lemsip. I’m using first defence spray and continuing to take my vitamins (C, D and magnesium) Hopefully I’ll be OK. I’m also staying away from him and increasing the handwashing routine.