Raimondo: Flu shots important

PROVIDENCE – As she prepares to take office, Gov.-elect Gina M. Raimondo is stressing to Rhode Islanders the importance of flu shots.

Raimondo recently received a flu shot from Dr. Michael Fine, director of the Rhode Island Department of Health.

“Our whole family gets vaccinated every year because we know that it’s our best defense against the flu,” Raimondo said. “I urge anyone who hasn’t been vaccinated to consider getting a flu shot today.”

Raimondo’s husband, Andrew Moffit, and their two children were also vaccinated by Fine.

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Raimondo and Fine both urged Rhode Islanders to get flu shots, as the annual flu season gets underway in the Ocean State.

Even as public anxiety about Ebola was at its recent fever pitch, health experts around the country, including Centers for Disease Control Director Thomas Frieden, have maintained their focus on influenza.

Influenza, according to CDC figures, annually claims from several thousand to many tens of thousands of lives in the United States.

In 2013, more than 100 children died from flu-related complications in the United States.

“Many of those deaths might have been prevented if children had gotten a flu vaccination,” Frieden said.

In Rhode Island, Fine has made a series of appeals to the public to take time out for a shot.

“When you get a flu shot, you are not just protecting yourself,” Fine said. “You are also helping to keep all of the people in your life healthy by preventing the spread of the flu.”

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