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Top 14 Flu Myths

What’s the truth about the flu, and what’s myth?

By R. Morgan Griffin
WebMD Feature

Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD

Myths about the flu are everywhere. According to many experts, misconceptions and rumors about the flu are as hard to contain and as hard to fight as the virus itself. And given the recent swine flu outbreaks in the U.S., panicking people are spreading some of those myths faster than ever.

“There are urban myths and rural myths about the flu,” says William Schaffner, MD, chairman of the department of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University’s School of Medicine in Nashville, Tenn. “Flu myths are everywhere.”

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Unfortunately, flu myths are common even among the people who should know better, like health care workers. Given that influenza – including seasonal flu and swine flu -- can be serious and even fatal, it’s crucial that we all know what’s fact and what’s fable. So as a public service, and with the help of some flu experts from around the country, WebMD helps you debunk the top 14 flu myths.

Flu Myth #1: The seasonal flu vaccine protects against swine flu.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t. The swine flu virus that first appeared in Mexico during April 2009 is a different strain of influenza virus. There is no vaccine for it. So even if you got a flu vaccine earlier this season, it won’t offer any protection against swine influenza.

Will there be a swine flu vaccine? Nothing’s clear yet, but the CDC and the World Health Organization are taking steps to develop one. But even if researchers started work right now, it would take many months to develop and manufacture a swine flu vaccine. In the meantime, the best advice is to wash your hands regularly, to cover your mouth and nose when you sneeze and cough, and to steer clear of people who are sick.

Flu Myth #2: The seasonal flu is annoying but harmless.

There has been a lot of focus on swine flu, but it’s important to remember that the run-of-the-mill seasonal flu can be a serious condition itself. “A lot of people just think of the flu as a very bad cold,” says Curtis Allen, a spokesman for the CDC in Atlanta. But it’s much worse than that.

For one, you usually feel terrible. In addition to the congestion and cough, you’re apt to have nasty body aches and fever, which are less likely with a garden-variety cold. “When you get the flu, you know it,” says Christine Hay, MD, assistant professor at the University of Rochester Medical Center. “You feel like you’ve been hit by a Mack truck.”

Aside from the short-term misery and lost workdays, flu can have more serious implications. Sure, most people who get the seasonal flu recover just fine. But the seasonal flu also hospitalizes 200,000 people in the U.S. each year. It kills about 36,000. That’s close to the number of women killed by breast cancer each year, and more than twice the number of people killed by AIDS.