Even though getting a flu vaccine every year is recommended as the best way to protect yourself from the influenza virus, common misconceptions about the flu shot remain.

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“Myths about the flu shot persist, but it’s important to know the truth because flu is a potentially deadly disease,” Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Tennessee, told weather.com. “Vaccine offers protection, so we all ought to take advantage of as much protection as we can get, so we do everything we can to remain healthy and we don’t contribute to the spread of flu.”

Click ahead as experts dispel some of the common myths about the flu shot.

Misconception: The flu shot gives you the flu.

“Some people think that if you get the flu shot that actually, somehow, you will get influenza as an immediate consequence of that flu shot and of course, that’s totally incorrect,” Schaffner said. Flu shots are made from small, purified pieces of flu virus that has been killed and they cannot infect you, he said.

“The virus is killed and then just pieces of the surface of the virus, not the interior, are separated out and purified and that makes up the vaccines,” he said. “There’s no way for the virus to reconstitute itself after the inoculation.”

“It’s like the virus is a car,” he added. “We’re only inoculating you with pieces of the fenders and obviously the fenders can’t reconstitute the whole car.”

Misconception: You can’t get the flu if you’ve had a flu shot.

“The flu shot is not a perfect vaccine,” said Dr. Richard Martinello, medical director of infection prevention at Yale-New Haven Hospital in Connecticut. “While it’s the best, single action anybody can take to help prevent the flu, it does not provide perfect protection.”

The effectiveness of the shot varies by year and depends partly on how well matched the viruses used to make the vaccine are to the flu viruses that are actually circulating. The vaccine usually protects against three to four strains of flu every year.

“When there’s a good match, the vaccine works quite well, providing levels of protection as high as 80 to 90 percent,” Martinello said. “Sometimes it fails because the vaccine isn’t well matched to the flu viruses that are circulating.”

Schaffner said the vaccine can provide as much as 80 percent protection in people under age 65 and about 50 to 60 percent complete protection in older adults.

Misconception: I don’t need a flu shot because I never get the flu or because I’m pretty healthy.

“Everybody can get the flu and during a typical year, about 10 to 20 percent of the population will get the flu,” Martinello said. “In any given year, most people don’t get it. However, it’s impossible to predict, if you are going to get it or not going to get it. It’s best to get a flu shot to help protect yourself than to take that risk.”

Schaffner hears all the time from people in their 20s and 30s saying they’ve never had the flu. But a flu shot is still recommended.

“The flu virus is very nasty,” he said. “It can take a perfectly healthy young person and put them in the emergency room or in the ICU within 48 hours.”

“Even young people should get vaccinated because they might be that unfortunate person who gets very ill and also because they don’t want to spread it to others,” Schaffner said, adding that a person can be spreading the virus a day before feeling sick.

Misconception: You don’t need a flu shot every year.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends an annual flu vaccine for most people 6 months and older.

“Unlike the measles virus, the flu virus has the capacity to change genetically,” Schaffner said. “Different flu strains can be prominent from one year to the next, so the vaccine’s composition is changed annually, trying to keep up with the changes in the virus.”

Misconception: Certain chronic health conditions can exempt you from needing a flu shot.

While many people with certain health conditions do get their flu shot every year, some do not and don’t realize that certain factors put them at higher risk for having complications due to flu, Martinello said. Those include people who are: over age 65, up to 2 years old, obese, pregnant or have chronic conditions like congestive heart failure, diabetes, kidney disease or HIV.

“The flu is pretty miserable at best, but if you develop complications, it can be life threatening,” Martinello said. “Sometimes people with those factors don’t realize how bad it can be.”