A funding bill approved in the U-S Senate includes new money for research into a universal flu vaccine. Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar introduced the Flu Vaccine Act earlier this year. It provides additional resources over the next five years to help develop a more effective, universal flu vaccine. Klobuchar says it will provide critical research at the National Institutes of Health to finally develop a universal vaccine so Minnesotans and all Americans can be better protected from all variations of the flu. The current vaccine is about 60-percent effective at best. Minnesota had 65-hundred flu-related hospitalizations last season and five pediatric deaths.