BROOKINGS – Voting is a civic duty to many, and with election season concluded, local healthcare providers are urging Brookings residents to practice what they see as another vital civic duty: getting their flu shots.

Flu season starts in early fall and continues through into late spring. The 2017-2018 flu season was classified as high severity, and that’s likely to be similar for this flu season as well. Both Brookings clinics take their duty and the risk of its spread seriously, with all staff required to get vaccinated before flu season gets underway.

The shot contains an inactive virus that allows your body to build an immunity against what is still a serious illness. Different from the stomach flu, influenza is a respiratory illness and is highly contagious. It’s spread through droplets dispersed from the mouth or nose, and people are contagious before symptoms appear and about five to seven days after symptoms disappear, which allows the disease to easily be spread, according to Jessie Myhre, clinic nurse manager at Avera Medical Group.

There are two main strains of influenza associated with flu season: Type A and Type B, with Type A being the more common of the two.

“As of Oct. 27, just in the state of South Dakota, there have been 13 confirmed Influenza A cases as opposed to no Influenza B cases so far,” Myhre said.

And it can infect even the healthiest of people, though others are greater risks of hospitalization and death from the disease. Especially at risk are the elderly, young children, pregnant women and people with certain health conditions or who live in group settings such as nursing homes or jails, Myhre said.

So, although healthier people might be dismissive of it, thinking they’ll likely just miss a couple of days of school or work, they should think of everyone they come into contact with, Sanford Health Clinic LPN Kelsey Stoltenberg said. 

“You got to look at it as you’re not only protecting yourself, but you’re protecting your pregnant neighbor next door, you’re protecting the elderly woman you pass in the grocery store, your infant niece and so forth,” Stoltenberg said.

“We are taking every step possible” to encourage vaccinations, Stoltenberg said. “Every person who walks in our door, every contact we have with our patients, we are addressing the flu vaccination. Until we know that every one of our patients has been covered, we’re going to bring it up every time we see you.”

According to the CDC, as of Oct. 27, there have been a total of 185 children who died from the flu in the U.S. during the 2017-2018 flu season, with 80 percent of those deaths occurring in children who had not received a flu vaccination for that flu season.

“People just need to realize how serious of an illness this is. It’s not just something that’ll wipe you out for a couple of days. There are deaths and hospitalizations from it, and I don’t think that is weighed heavily enough,” Stoltenberg said.

Getting a flu shot is the first line of defense against the flu. All the same, standard precautions are recommended to reduce the likelihood of spreading it and other diseases: washing hands, staying home if you feel ill, proper nutrition, plenty of sleep, water and physical activity.

Both clinics agreed that if you think you might have the flu, you should come in to be checked so proper treatment can begin.

And don’t worry about getting the flu from the vaccine, both Myhre and Sanford Health Clinic pediatrician Ashley Huffingham said, as it’s impossible.

“The vaccine is inactivated, meaning that the virus is dead,” Myhre said. For the two weeks following vaccination, the body is then busy developing antibodies against that virus, and it might make you feel a bit drained in the meantime, “but it’s not that you’ve gotten the virus.”

If you do actually come down the flu, what’s more likely to have happened is that you caught the flu before being vaccinated, and it’s only coincidental timing.

It could also be that the vaccine in that instance failed, as the vaccine isn’t 100 percent protective, Huffingham said. Still, she said, “it’s scientifically impossible for an inactivated virus like the flu shot to give you the flu.”

Both clinics welcome walk-ins for anyone interested in getting a flu shot as well as setting up appointments. Avera Medical Group can be reached at 697-9500, and Sanford Health Clinic at 697-1900.

Sanford Clinic has offered flu shot clinics in the evening “because we do understand that people work and aren’t necessarily able to make that 8-5 timeframe. We’ve already run a few of those clinics in the evening and plan on doing some more of those in the future,” Stoltenberg said.

The next flu shot clinic will be held from 5-7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 26. They are now accepting appointments for that time.

Contact Eric Sandbulte at esandbulte@brookingsregister.com.