Now is time to consider getting a flu shot

ZANESVILLE – The Muskingum Valley Health Center is starting to receive its shipments of flu vaccines and it plans to use a drive-up window system where patrons can simply drive to the building and get their flu shot.

“Obviously, all of our sites will have age appropriate vaccines so we’ll have the flu shots ready for everybody six months and over. Yeah, we should be getting them in soon (and) we should have them at all of our sites pretty soon. Some of our sites have them now but not every site has them fully ready yet,” MVHC Nurse Practitioner Kyle Carpenter said.

If you’re on the fence about getting a flu shot this year, Carpenter shares reasons why its a good idea.

“The reason they’re important is for a few reasons. For one, they reduce your risk of getting influenza and the ones that we give protect against four kinds. Some do three, most do four kinds of influenza. That’s why some people can still get the flu even if you get the flu shot but the people who do get it don’t get as sick. So, we know that flu shots reduce hospital emissions by about forty percent and people that get the flu usually have four days fewer stays in the hospitals when they get it,” Carpenter said.

Carpenter says the best time to get your flu shot is before the end of October.