Jonathan M. Berkowitz, MD

What you need to know about fighting and easing flu symptoms.

Medical science has exploded exponentially since then, of course, but the influenza vaccine, our bulwark of defense, remains potentially flawed. Flawed because influenza's viral coat mutates constantly, creating new strains with altered sites of attack. This mutation forces the scientists responsible for formulating the annual vaccine to predict which strain will dominate. Predicting wrong can spell disaster, yielding an ineffective vaccine that could leave millions unprotected. This guesswork, coupled with potential vaccine shortages, has many experts concerned that another pandemic - a severe, often deadly worldwide outbreak - is lurking on the horizon. 

"Unlike 1918, we're better able to treat influenza and its complications," says Keiji Fukuda, MD, chief of epidemiology, influenza section, for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. "The downside is we have an older population that tends to get hit hard by flu. The single most important action a person can take to avoid influenza is vaccination." 
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