Get your flu shot, urge Nunavik health officials

Nunavimmiut are urged to get vaccinated for influenza or rotavirus, which can both cause serious illness. This public vaccine clinic was held in Kangiqsujuaq in 2010. (FILE PHOTO)

You and your kids don’t want to get sick this winter— and that’s why Nunavik’s public health department is urging everyone in the region to take advantage of its free vaccination program, launched Nov. 1.

The flu shot available at local health clinics will protect you against influenza, an easily-spread infection of the respiratory tract caused by a virus, which usually circulates during the winter months.

Flu symptoms include fever, fatigue, muscular pain, coughing and headaches.

But the flu can also cause more serious complications among some people.

And some groups are more at risk of catching the virus, which is why Nunavik health officials suggest the following groups get vaccinated this season:

• people 60 years and over;

• children in good health, aged six to 23 months (babies under six months cannot receive the vaccination);

• people of all ages suffering from a chronic disease;

• residents of extended-care centres;

• pregnant women starting at 13 weeks of pregnancy; and

• health care workers and workers in daycares and schools.

The flu vaccine reaches its maximum effectiveness roughly two weeks after it’s injected, explains a Nunavik health board release on the vaccination program.

Then, you’re protected against the flu from six to 12 months.

Health workers in Nunavik are also giving Rotarix, a vaccine against rotavirus, to all Nunavik babies when they’re two months old.

Rotavirus is the primary cause of gastroenteritis and diarrhea among children under five years of age in Quebec.

The new vaccination program aims to cut down on the hundreds of children who are hospitalized from the virus each year.

The symptoms of illness usually show up one to three days after contact with the virus, which is spread by the feces of an infected person.

The initial symptoms are vomiting and high fever, followed by severe diarrhea. Rotavirus can last for up to a week, causing serious dehydration in young children.

Rotarix is given in two doses: one at two months and another at four months.

For more information or to book a vaccination, Nunavimmiut should contact their local health centre, the regional health board says.