Alberta’s flu season has begun and efforts to fight the virus are underway.
“I get one every year and it seems to work for me,” said Calgary resident Victor Lukawitski.
“I have senior parents in town and it’s just a precaution—more for them than it is for me—but I get it every year regardless of whether they’re around or not,” said Sharleen Dion.
Alberta Health Services will start operating flu shot clinics on Tuesday, after confirming Thursday that Edmonton is in the midst of the year’s first flu outbreak. Crowds were also lining up at clinics in Calgary, such as Sunpark Plaza.
“There was a herd of people this morning that was waiting at our door prior to opening,” said Medicine Shoppe Pharmacy pharmacist My Hoang. “I thought demand might be down, a lot of people giving me feedback that they…thought that the flu shot didn’t work last year because there were so many flu illnesses.”
The new flu vaccine is available to anyone over the age of six months.
Thirty per cent of Albertans received a flu shot last year, which is below the national average. AHS is hoping to have more than 40 per cent of the province vaccinated this year.
“I would sooner just get it, even if it’s not 100 per cent effective, at least it’s somewhat effective,” said Norm Pierce, who got his flu shot Tuesday in Calgary.
AHS believes this year’s edition of the flu vaccine will be more effective than the edition produced last year. Last year’s flu vaccine failed to protect against a mutated strain of the influenza A virus. More than 100 people died in Alberta last year of flu-related illnesses.
READ MORE: Alberta’s flu-related deaths surpass 100 this season
This year, there aren’t likely to be as many problems.
“We’re expecting a much, much better match than last year, that’s for sure,” said Dr. Martin Lavoie, the province’s Deputy Chief Medical Officer.
“The event that happened last year is actually an odd situation, it doesn’t happen very often.
“We tend to have some mismatch, and last year was more of a severe mismatch. We don’t anticipate that to happen.”
AHS medical officer of health Dr. Judy MacDonald added time will tell how effective the vaccine is this year.
“Every year we have this question and we really don’t know,” she said Tuesday. “It’s too soon to really know what we’re dealing with either in terms of the circulating virus or how well it will match with the circulating virus that we got.”
Health officials hope last year won’t deter people from getting the flu shot.
“It’s important for people to realize, even if there’s not an exact match, getting vaccinated is still the best way to protect yourself,” said AHS Senior Medical Officer Dr. Gerry Perdy.
There is a complete schedule for next week’s flu shot clinics on the AHS website.
With files from Global’s Heather Yourex-West
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