Harsh flu season has health officials worried about brain complications in children

This year’s harsh flu season – the most intense in 15 years – has federal health officials trying to understand if it sparked an increase in a rare but life-threatening brain complication in children.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates 19,000 people have died from the flu so far this winter, including 86 children.Thursday, the CDC reported at least nine of those children experienced brain complications, and it has asked state health departments to help investigate if there are more such cases.There is some good news: The CDC also reported that this year’s flu shots do a pretty good job preventing hospitalization from the flu — among the 45% of Americans who got vaccinated.

But it comes a day after the Trump administration added to the uncertainty roiling government health agencies by canceling a meeting of experts who are supposed to help choose the recipe for next winter’s flu vaccine.Still, it’s not too late to get vaccinated this year: “If you haven’t gotten your flu shot yet, get it because we’re still seeing high flu circulation in most of the country,” said Dr.Sean O’Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics.Flu shot effectiveness varies from year to year.

While not great at blocking infections, the vaccine’s main role “is to keep you out of the hospital and to keep you alive,” said Vanderbilt University vaccine expert Dr.William Schaffner.Preliminary CDC data released Thursday found children who got this year’s vaccine were between 64% and 78% less likely to be hospitalized than their unvaccinated counterparts, and adults were 41% to 55% less likely to be hospitalized.What about those brain complications? Earlier this month, state health departments and hospitals warned doctors to watch for child flu patients with seizures, hallucinations or other signs of “influenza-associated encephalopathy or encephalitis” — and a more severe subtype called “acute necrotizing encephalopathy.” Encephali...