People suffering from influenza are at a higher risk of suffering from a heart attack.

According to a report released this week, people, especially adults, who have had the flu, are six times prone to a heart attack. The study, which was released by New England Journal of Medicine, was based on about 20,000 adult cases of laboratory-confirmed influenza infection in Ontario, Canada between 2009 and 2014.

The results have revealed that 332 patients suffered a heart attack within a year of having been sick with influenza B infections. Of the 332 people included in the study, it was discovered that 69 percent did not have a flu shot.

“Our findings are important because an association between influenza and acute myocardial infarction reinforces the importance of vaccination,” revealed Jeff Kwong, the lead author of the study and a scientist at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences and Public Health Ontario.

It has been observed that the risk for a heart attack was higher within the first week of acquiring influenza. While other respiratory viruses were also seen as factors for the increased risk of a heart attack, they were not as potent as the flu virus.

“It’s not every day you see a six-fold increase in the risk during the first seven days of lab-confirmed influenza. We were also surprised the risk dropped off to nothing by day 8 and beyond,” Kwong said.

Because of the findings, Kwong has urged new “international guidelines that advocate for influenza immunization in those at high risk of a…