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Flu vaccine still suggested Shot less effective this year, but does offer some protection By ALLISON GOODRICH agoodrich@shawmedia.com The dreaded flu is in the air. The McHenry County Health Board reported 54 cases that tested positive this week, adding to the 45 cases reported last week. This season, influenza A (H3N2) viruses are the most frequently reported, according to an advisory from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And while they’ve been advised by the CDC that this year’s vaccine could be less effective because of drifted flu viruses – a virus can mutate so it doesn’t entirely match the
strains included in the vaccine – local health agencies agree the vaccination is still important. “This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get a flu shot,” health department spokeswoman Debra Quackenbush said. “It’ll still give you some protection against the flu.” Irfan Hafiz, chief medical officer at Centegra Health System and an infectious disease specialist, explained that while a flu shot this year may not completely prevent symptoms, it can reduce the risk of those symptoms becoming severe.
Pediatric care nurse Maribeth Barkocy prepares a traditional influenza vaccine shot. While a flu shot this year may not completely prevent symptoms, it can reduce the risk of severe illness.
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Report details torture’s impact Provokes strong reactions among lawmakers, others
H. Rick Bamman file photo – hbamman@ shawmedia.com
See FLU SHOTS, page A5
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By BRADLEY KLAPPER and KEN DILANIAN The Associated Press WASHINGTON – The United States brutalized scores of terror suspects with interrogation tactics that turned secret CIA prisons into chambers of suffering and did nothing to make America safer after the 9/11 attacks, Senate investigators concluded Tuesday. The Senate Intelligence Committee’s torture report, years in the making, accused the CIA of misleading its political masters about what it was doing with its “black site” captives and deceiving the nation about the effectiveness of its techniques. The report was the first public accounting of tactics employed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and it described far harsher More actions than had inside been widely known. Tactics includn Detainee ed confinement to Zubaydah a small boxes, weeks key figure of sleep deprivain Senate tion, simulated report. B4 drowning, slapping n 5 major and slamming, and threats to kill, harm takeaways or sexually abuse from the CIA families of the cap- report. B4 tives. The report produced revulsion among many, challenges to its veracity among some lawmakers and a sharp debate about whether it should have been released at all. GOP Sen. John McCain, tortured in Vietnam as a prisoner of war, was out of step with some fellow Republicans in welcoming the report and endorsing its findings. “We gave up much in the expectation that torture would make us safer,” he said in a Senate speech. “Too much.” Five hundred pages were released, representing the executive summary and conclusions of a still-classified 6,700-page full investigation. President Barack Obama declared some of the past practices to be “brutal, and as I’ve said before, constituted torture in my mind. And that’s not who we are,” he told the Spanish-language TV network Telemundo in an interview. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, the Democratic committee chairman whose staff prepared
Battling burnout on the job
Kyle Grillot – kgrillot@shawmedia.com
Patient care technician Amy Wilson (left) talks Tuesday with registered nurse Jennifer Kennedy at Centegra Hospital – McHenry. Kennedy was able to take multiple vacations in 2014, including one to Hawaii and a recent trip to visit family in Florida. A recent comparison shows employees in the U.S. took an average of 16 vacation days in 2013, down from 20.3 days in 2000.
McHenry County employers weigh in on using paid vacation time By ALLISON GOODRICH agoodrich@shawmedia.com
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n a scale of importance from one to 10, Jennifer Kennedy, an employee of Centegra Hospital – McHenry, would rank taking time off from work as a solid eight. “I take a vacation usually twice a year, especially because my family lives out of state,” said Kennedy, who just recently returned from a weeklong Thanksgiving trip to the Florida panhandle. “And if I’m going out of state, it’s
Voice your opinion Have you or will you use all of your vacation days in 2014? Vote online at NWHerald.com.
typically a week to make the trip worth it.” Between those more extended travels, the nurse educator will go on the occasional short vacation with friends and said she’s encouraged by her employer to take a few days ahead
or behind work-related trips, last year taking a total of three and a half weeks off. Her mentality may not be common nationwide as the U.S. workforce last year left 429 million days of paid time off unused, according to a 2014 study. However, employers in McHenry County say employees do take the time they are entitled to take. Commissioned by the U.S. Travel Association and conducted by Oxford Economics – a
See VACATION, page A5 See TORTURE, page A5
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