Time to get COVID, flu shots, City's public health director says

CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) - The Chicago Department of Public Health is urging people to get vaccinated as the weather is about to get cooler and the risk of respiratory illnesses increases.

The City’s public health commissioner, Dr. Simbo Ige, wants to see people vaccinated for COVID, Flu and, in some cases, RSV.

“We know that COVID hit us hard over the last four years,” Ige said Thursday. “We lost far too many people, and, now we are in a good place with COVID in terms of mortality, and the reason for that is many people got vaccinated…We want to keep that trend going.

“We went from a high of many hundreds of death from COVID to now where we barely have any death from COVID across all races and ethnicities.”

She said  it’s especially important that those 65 and over and those with heart disease or diabetes get an updated COVID shot.

Ige added that getting vaccinated could save your life.

“You need to get your flu vaccine every year, and now you need to get your COVID vaccine every year, because these viruses are smart,” she said. “They twist and change and tweak their presentation each year, and so we tweak the vaccines and make sure the vaccines are updated and upgraded to respond to whatever is circulating.

“It may not stop you from getting sick at all, but it stops you from getting on the ventilator, it stops you from dying from the disease.”

Listen to WBBM Newsradio now on Audacy!
Sign up and follow WBBM Newsradio
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | TikTok