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Why aren’t more older adults getting flu or COVID-19 shots?

Poll suggests need for more communication about vaccines’ power to reduce risk of severe illness in people over 50

Michigan Medicine - University of Michigan

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National Poll on Healthy Aging data from adults age 50 and over who replied to a poll in late December 2025 and early January 2026 saying that they had not received a flu vaccination in the last 6 months and/or had not received a COVID-19 vaccination in the last year, showing the main reason why they had not done so.

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Credit: Emily Smith - University of Michigan

This winter’s brutal flu season isn’t over, and COVID-19 cases have risen recently too. But a new poll taken in recent weeks shows that vaccination against both viruses lags among people 50 and over, and the national survey reveals key reasons why.

In all, the University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging shows, 42% of people over 50 haven’t gotten either flu or COVID-19 vaccines in the past six months, though 29% have gotten both and 27% have gotten just the updated flu shot.

The poll also asked about COVID-19 vaccination since it became available in 2021: 49% of people over 50 said it’s been more than a year since their last dose, and 15% said they’ve never received it.

The leading reason people over 50 gave for not getting updated vaccines?

They didn’t think they needed them.

In all, 28% of people over 50 who didn’t get a flu vaccine in the past six months, and 29% of those who didn’t get a COVID-19 vaccine in the past year or ever, gave this as the main reason.

That’s despite clear evidence showing that staying up to date on both vaccines reduces the risk of serious illness and death in older adults, whose immune systems need regular “reminders” with updated vaccines tailored to recent mutations in the viruses.

Coming in second among reasons for not getting vaccinated recently were worries about the vaccines’ side effects (19% for flu and 27% for COVID-19), followed by a belief that the vaccines aren’t effective (18% and 19%, respectively).

Far fewer (10% for flu and 6% for COVID-19, respectively) said they just didn’t think of it. A few (4% and 3%) wanted to wait, and from 1% to 4% cited time, cost, insurance, availability or eligibility concerns.

The findings could help health care providers and public health agencies communicate better with middle-aged and older adults about the health benefits of annual vaccination and address any concerns, misinformation, or barriers.

The poll is based at the U-M Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation and supported by Michigan Medicine, U-M's academic medical center.

From late December 2025 to mid-January 2026, the poll team asked 2,964 U.S. adults age 50 and over if they’d gotten a flu vaccine dose in the last six months, and when their most recent COVID-19 vaccination was. Then, the team asked those who hadn’t sought vaccination recently their main reason why.

“The evidence is clear: these viruses can lead to serious illness, hospitalization, and death. That risk increases with age and underlying health conditions, and vaccination reduces that risk,” said Jeffrey Kullgren, M.D., M.P.H., M.S., the poll’s director, an Associate Professor of Internal Medicine at the U-M Medical School and a primary care physician at the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System.

“These findings suggest that we must do a much better job helping people in their 50s and up understand that they will benefit from getting these updated vaccines each year, that the vaccine side effects are mild and short-lived, and that even if they later get infected and develop symptoms, vaccination means they won’t get as sick,” he added.

Emphasizing individual impacts is important, he noted. Experts and news stories often discuss vaccine effectiveness in percentages based on how well the vaccine reduces the risk of hospitalization or death in a population.

That’s different from what an individual might care most about: whether it will keep them from getting sick at all, or seriously ill, Kullgren said.

Even when a vaccine isn’t a perfect match for the virus strains that are circulating, a recent dose still nudges the immune system to be ready to fight off the virus in general, and can help reduce the severity and duration of symptoms, he notes.

No impact from changed recommendation for COVID-19 shot

Last spring, leaders at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration signaled a change in the agency’s recommendation about which adults should receive the COVID-19 vaccination. This was followed by an official change in the FDA approval and the recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in late summer.

But the poll suggests this change didn’t play a major role in older adults’ decision-making. Less than 1% of respondents who chose not to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in the last year said their main reason was they thought they weren’t eligible.

And in fact, the federal change only affects some of those who were polled: Those who are aged 50 to 64 without any chronic health condition that raises COVID-19 risk.

COVID-19 vaccination is still recommended for most older adults, including two doses a year for everyone over age 65 and anyone with a compromised immune system, and one dose a year for those under 65 who have underlying health conditions that put them at higher risk of severe COVID-19.

Many people ages 50 to 64 have at least one of those qualifying conditions, which include diabetes, asthma, obesity, high blood pressure, current or previous smoking, and physical inactivity.

The CDC didn’t change its recommendation that everyone over the age of 6 months should get an annual flu vaccination. And major medical societies and insurance companies announced that they would continue recommending or covering both vaccines for all children over 6 months and all adults, regardless of health status.

Differences in vaccination uptake

In addition to revealing reasons older adults didn’t get updated vaccines, the new poll data show some key differences in vaccination among different groups of people 50 and over.

The oldest adults (age 75 and over)– those with the highest risk of hospitalization and death from both viruses – had the highest rates of updated vaccination.

In all, 46% of those age 75 and up said they had gotten a COVID-19 vaccine in the last six months, compared with 37% of those age 65 to 74 and 20% of those age 50 to 64.

Flu vaccination was even higher in all age groups, with 76% of those in the oldest age bracket having gotten the latest flu shot, compared with 64% of those age 65 to 74 and 42% of those in their 50s and early 60s.

"This gap between flu and COVID-19 vaccination represents an opportunity to connect the dots for older patients: both of these viruses can put them at risk, both of them mutate rapidly, and both vaccines should be an annual tradition, even if they don’t get them at the same time,” said Kullgren.

He also points to the poll’s positive finding that adults 50 and over who report having at least one chronic health condition were much more likely to have gotten flu and COVID-19 shots recently than those without a chronic condition.

But even among those with chronic health conditions, 39% said they hadn’t had either vaccine in the last six months, though this rate was much lower than the 59% of those without chronic conditions who said so.

The poll also suggests a need for focus on those who have never gotten vaccinated against COVID-19, as they grow older and their risk of severe outcomes rises.

In all, 20% of those age 50 to 64 said they had never gotten a COVID-19 vaccine, along with 12% of those age 65 to 75 and 7% of those age 75 and up.

There’s also an income gap, with 19% of all those with household incomes under $60,000 saying they’ve never had a COVID-19 shot, compared with 12% of those with incomes over $60,000.

Not too late to vaccinate, including second doses of COVID-19 vaccine

Kullgren notes that it’s not too late in the current respiratory virus season for anyone to get a flu or COVID-19 vaccine if they haven’t already done so. It’s also almost time for second doses of the COVID-19 vaccine for those over 65 or with moderately to severely compromised immune systems who got this year’s version soon after it arrived in early September. They are recommended to get another dose starting six months after receiving the first.

So, if someone received their first dose in the first week of September, for instance, they can receive a second dose starting the first week in February. See the detailed adult vaccine schedule and the page about COVID-19 vaccines for immunocompromised people.

About the poll

The poll findings come from a nationally representative survey conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago for IHPI and administered online and via phone from December 29, 2025 to January 13, 2026 among 2,964 U.S. adults ages 50 to 98. The sample was weighted to reflect the national population. 

Read past National Poll on Healthy Aging reports and Michigan findings, and learn about the poll methodology. 

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Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

 

Study reveals two huge hot blobs of rock influence Earth’s magnetic field

University of Liverpool

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Exploring Earth’s deep interior is a far bigger challenge than exploring the solar system. While we have travelled 25 billion km into space, the deepest we have ever gone below our feet is just over 12 km.

Consequently, little is known about the conditions at the base of the mantle and the top of the core – the most significant interface in the Earth’s interior and the region where new research has now uncovered exciting magnetic activity.

In a study published in Nature Geoscience, research led by the University of Liverpool has identified magnetic evidence that two immense, ultra-hot rock structures located at the base of Earth’s mantle, around 2,900 kilometres beneath Africa and the Pacific, affect the underlying liquid outer core.

The study shows that these enormous blobs of solid, superheated material — encircled by a pole-to-pole ring of cooler rock — have been shaping Earth’s magnetic field for millions of years.

Both measuring ancient magnetic fields and simulating the processes that generate them are technically demanding.

To investigate these deep-Earth features, the research team combined palaeomagnetic observations with advanced computer simulations of the geodynamo - the flow of liquid iron in the outer core that generates Earth’s magnetic field like a wind-turbine generates electricity.

Numerical models enabled them to reconstruct key observations of the behaviour of the magnetic field seen over the past 265 million years. Even with a supercomputer, running such simulations, especially over long timescales, represents an immense computational challenge.

The results revealed that the outer core’s upper boundary is far from uniform in temperature. Instead, it displays strong thermal contrasts, with localised hot regions capped by the continent-sized rock structures.

It also showed that some parts of the magnetic field appear to have remained relatively stable for hundreds of millions of years, while others have changed significantly through time.

Andy Biggin, Professor of Geomagnetism at the University of Liverpool, said: “These findings suggest that there are strong temperature contrasts in the rocky mantle just above the core and that, beneath the hotter regions, the liquid iron in the core may stagnate rather than participate in the vigorous flow seen beneath the cooler regions.

“Gaining such insights into the deep Earth on very long timescales strengthens the case for using records of the ancient magnetic field to understand both the dynamic evolution of the deep Earth and its more stable properties.

“These findings also have important implications for questions surrounding ancient continental configurations—such as the formation and breakup of Pangaea—and may help resolve long-standing uncertainties in ancient climate, palaeobiology, and the formation of natural resources. These areas have assumed that Earth’s magnetic field, when averaged over long periods, behaved as a perfect bar magnet aligned with the planet’s rotational axis. Our findings are that this may not quite be true”

The paper, ‘Mantle heterogeneity influenced Earth’s ancient magnetic field’ is published in Nature Geosciences (DOI: 10.1038/s41561-025-01910-1)

The study was conducted by scientists from the DEEP (Determining Earth Evolution using Palaeomagnetism) research group in the University of Liverpool’s School of Environmental Sciences working alongside researchers from the University of Leeds.

Professor Biggin and his team specialise in analysing the magnetic signatures preserved in rocks from around the world to reconstruct the history of Earth’s magnetic field and internal dynamics.

DEEP was established in 2017 with support from the Leverhulme Trust and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

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Journal

Nature Geoscience

DOI

10.1038/s41561-025-01910-1 

Article Publication Date

3-Feb-2026

 

Oxygen-modified graphene filters boost natural gas purification

Adding oxygen to ultrathin graphene enables efficient carbon dioxide removal from methane while maintaining high permeability

Chiba University

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Introducing oxygen groups at graphene pore edges strengthens carbon dioxide (CO2) selectivity over methane (CH4), allowing rapid gas flow while efficiently removing impurities from gas mixtures.

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Credit: Associate Professor Tomonori Ohba from Chiba University, Japan

As we shift toward more sustainable fuels, natural gas and biogas, which mainly contain methane (CH4), have become important sources of energy and raw materials for chemical production. However, these gases also contain impurities that must be removed before use. One major contaminant is carbon dioxide (CO2), which reduces the energy content of the gas and can cause corrosion in pipelines.

One promising method for efficiently separating CO2 from these gases is filtration using graphene membranes containing nanosized pores. Graphene is particularly attractive as a filtration material because of its exceptional mechanical strength and chemical and thermal stability. While pristine graphene is naturally impermeable to gases, introducing pores allows it to selectively separate gas molecules.

Now, researchers at Chiba University, Japan, led by Associate Professor Tomonori Ohba, along with Shunsuke Hasumi from the Graduate School of Science, Chiba University, have shown how ultrathin oxygen-functionalized graphene membranes can efficiently separate CO2 from CH4. Their study was made available online on December 8, 2025, and will be published in Volume 248 of the journal Carbon on February 5, 2026. The findings offer a potential pathway toward next-generation gas purification systems.

“Membrane separation has emerged as a promising and environmentally friendly technique that provides high selectivity and permeability. Graphene could be an extremely permeable gas separation membrane; however, its practical implementation and separation ability require further improvement,” says Assoc. Prof. Ohba.

The pore size of the graphene membrane was found to be critical for effective gas separation. If the pores are too large, both CO2 and CH4 pass through indiscriminately. To investigate this effect, the researchers measured the flow of CO2 and CH4 through graphene membranes mounted in a custom-built mass spectrometer system. Alongside these experiments, they conducted detailed computer simulations that tracked the movement of CO2 and CH4 molecules through graphene pores ranging from 0.21 to 0.99 nanometers. These calculations accounted for molecular interactions and long-range Coulomb interactions, allowing the team to systematically examine how pore diameter and surface chemistry influence gas permeation.

The simulation results showed that porous graphene membranes exhibit extremely high permeability, allowing gases to pass through very easily. However, when pore sizes exceeded about 0.5 nanometers, the membranes showed little ability to distinguish between CO2 and CH4. Only pores closer to 0.4 nanometers exhibited noticeable selectivity. Experimental tests confirmed this overall trend, although the measured CO2 permeability was lower than predicted by simulations because the experimental membranes consisted of multiple graphene layers instead of a single layer.

A key factor explaining the difference between simulations and experiments was the presence of oxygen functional groups on real graphene membranes. These oxygen-containing groups naturally form at defects and edges in graphene. When the researchers incorporated these oxygen-modified regions into their simulations, the membrane allowed CO2 to pass through more easily while also separating it more effectively from CH4.

To confirm this experimentally, the researchers treated graphene membranes with oxygen plasma, intentionally introducing oxygen functional groups. The modified membranes showed significantly improved separation performance, closely matching the simulation results.

The enhanced selectivity was attributed to stronger interactions between CO2 molecules and oxygen functional groups at the edges of graphene pores. CO2 is more strongly attracted to these oxygen sites than CH4, allowing it to pass through the membrane more readily, even when pore sizes are relatively large.

The findings demonstrate that graphene membranes can achieve improved CO2 and CH4 separation while maintaining high permeability and flow rates, opening the door to industrial applications. “Such technology could lead to cheaper and cleaner energy by making biogas and natural gas purification more efficient, lowering CO2 emissions through high-efficiency separation, and reducing the energy required for industrial gas processing,” says Assoc. Prof. Ohba.

To see more news from Chiba University, click here.

 

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Reference:
Authors: Shunsuke Hasumi and Tomonori Ohba
Affiliations: Graduate School of Science, Chiba University, Japan
DOI: 10.1016/j.carbon.2025.121147

 

About Associate Professor Tomonori Ohba from Chiba University, Japan
Tomonori Ohba is an Associate Professor and Director of the Ohba Research Group at the Department of Chemistry, Graduate School of Science, Chiba University, Japan. He primarily works in the field of physical chemistry, aiming to elucidate chemical phenomena at the nanomolecular level by employing advanced theoretical and experimental methods. He also explores nanospaces to control molecular motion, investigate molecular behavior, and discover new molecular reactivities. His extensive research work, published in numerous reputable journals, has been cited more than 5,000 times.

 

Funding:
This research was supported by JSPS KAKENHI (Grant Number: 23H01999).

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Journal

Carbon

DOI

10.1016/j.carbon.2025.121147 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

Enhancing the CO2/CH4 gas separation performance of graphene membranes via oxygen functionalization

Article Publication Date

5-Feb-2026