Flu Shots Associated with 40% Reduced Risk of Alzheimer’s Disease

According to a recent study published by the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, UTHealth Houston researchers found people who received at least one influenza vaccine were 40% less likely than their non-vaccinated peers to develop Alzheimer’s disease over four years.

In a large nationwide sample of U.S. adults aged 65 and older published on June 13, 2022, during four-year follow-up appointments, about 5.1% of flu-vaccinated patients were found to have developed Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

Meanwhile, 8.5% of non-vaccinated patients had developed AD during follow-up in this study.

This finding is important since AD affects about six million people living in the USA.

“The strength of this protective effect increased with the number of years that a person received an annual flu vaccine – in other words, the rate of developing Alzheimer’s was lowest among those who consistently received the flu vaccine every year,” commented first author Avram S. Bukhbinder, M.D., a recent alumnus of McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, in a press release issued on June 24, 2022.

“Future research should assess whether flu vaccination is also associated with the rate of symptom progression in patients who already have Alzheimer’s dementia.”

Past studies have found a decreased risk of dementia associated with prior exposure to various adulthood vaccinations, including those for tetanus, polio, and herpes, in addition to the flu vaccine and others.

While several U.S. FDA-approved influenza vaccines are available today, the U.S. FDA has not approved an AD preventive vaccine as of June 26, 2022.

Additional influenza vaccine news is posted at PrecisionVaccinations.com/Flu.

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