Scientists Want to Completely Rethink How They Make the Flu Vaccine

The only thing worse than getting the flu is catching it after you’ve gotten a flu shot. It’s been a terrible year for outbreaks—the worst in almost a decade. Contributing to that is the high failure rate of this year’s vaccine. The current shot is just 25 percent effective against the H3N2 virus, this season’s most-often-identified strain by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The experts say, with enough time and money, they can do a lot better.

“There has to be a wholesale change to how we make the flu vaccine,” said Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at ...