[eastexsteve]

From the CDC: "There is still a possibility you could get the flu even if you got vaccinated. The ability of flu vaccine to protect a person depends on various factors, including the age and health status of the person being vaccinated, and also the similarity or “match” between the viruses used to make the vaccine and those circulating in the community. If the viruses in the vaccine and the influenza viruses circulating in the community are closely matched, vaccine effectiveness is higher. If they are not closely matched, vaccine effectiveness can be reduced. However, it’s important to remember that even when the viruses are not closely matched, the vaccine can still protect many people and prevent flu-related complications. Such protection is possible because antibodies made in response to the vaccine can provide some protection (called cross-protection) against different but related influenza viruses."

[Black Agnes]

If you’d bothered to read the exerpt I posted you’d have noted that the infected crew members GOT the same antigenic strain that they’d been vaccinated against.

24 of 25 with flu symptoms had been vaccinated.

They were youngsters, not the elderly.

It’s known that the flu shot does nothing for the elderly. I can post many medical papers attesting to this. The elderly simply do not have enough of a functioning immune system left to mount a response to the vaccine.

Also, this:

http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2012/03/13/cid.cis307

“Increased risk of non-influenza respiratory virus infections associated with receipt of inactivated influenza vaccine”