Flu clinics target high-risk groups

Supply dwindles, public urged to wait

Posted By BRETT CLARKSON, SUN MEDIA

Posted 25 days ago

After weeks of getting 722,000 H1N1 vaccines a week, Ontario this week will only have 276,300 doses to administer in the fight against the flu.

Dr. Arlene King, the province's chief medical officer of health, said officials were surprised and disappointed to learn on Friday that reduced production at a Quebec-based GlaxoSmithKline plant will mean a drastically shrunken supply this week.

"We were expecting at least what we had received previously, which was 722,000 doses per week, so it's obviously a significantly reduced supply from what we expected," she said today.

All of those 276,300 shots are intended for high-priority Ontario residents this week, officials said.

A total of 86,800 of that stockpile is specifically for pregnant women.

The remaining 189,500 will go to other priority residents.

King said wait times dropped at clinics open in the province Sunday after long lines outside clinics across the country became familiar images last week.

"We will have a dramatic escalation in clinics as of tomorrow, there will be over 100 clinics offered across the province," King said.

Health officials are pleading with Ontario residents who aren't part of the priority groups to not go out and try to get their shots yet.

Provincial Health Minister Deb Matthews appealed to Ontarians to be patient and respect the need for priority residents to be vaccinated first.

"They will be able to get the H1N1 vaccine flu shot as soon as we have more supply available," Matthews said.

But she couldn't say when Ontario would start receiving enough doses to start vaccinating the general public.

"The federal minister of health has assured me that over the coming weeks and months, there will be enough vaccine for everyone who needs it and wants it," Matthews said. "However, exactly when we will receive that vaccine is not known at this time."

Although health-care workers aren't asking to see a doctor's note from patients or any hard proof that they are priority patients, clinics across Ontario have been turning people away who do not meet the criteria.

The six priority groups include:

-Pregnant women.

-Healthy children between six months and five years of age.

-People under 65 with chronic conditions.

-People living in remote or isolated communities.

-Health-care workers.

-Household contacts and care providers of high-risk people who can't be immunized.

The reduced vaccination supply was caused when GlaxoSmithKline switched production to begin making doses specifically for pregnant women, King said. As a result, supplies across Canada are reduced.

There have so far been 31 deaths from H1N1 in Ontario, King said. A total of 609 people have been hospitalized with 82 of those patients still in hospital.

About 300 people who on average die from the seasonal flu a year in Ontario, King said.

Ontario has received about 2.2 million doses of vaccine. The province is expected to get 13 million doses before Christmas, which would be enough for everybody in Ontario to get a shot.

brett.clarkson@sunmedia.ca