By Roger McKinney
rmckinney@joplinglobe.com
COLUMBUS, Kan. — Health departments in Cherokee and Crawford counties are out of seasonal flu vaccine, while swine flu vaccine continues to trickle in slowly.
A spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment said the situation is the same statewide.
Betha Elliott, administrator for the Cherokee County Health Department, told the Cherokee County commissioners on Monday that the health department was out of seasonal flu vaccine.
“We’ve done more seasonal flu vaccine in six weeks than in a usual flu season,” Elliott told reporters during a break in the meeting. She said the department has administered 1,600 flu shots in the past six weeks.
She said she knows some residents who typically get their seasonal flu vaccines haven’t been able to do so this year because of increased demand for the vaccine.
She said manufacturers produced the same amount of vaccine this year as they did last year, but the increased demand has caused the shortage. She said the shortage of seasonal flu vaccine has no relation to the production of H1N1 vaccine.
Elliott said she didn’t know about prospects for getting more seasonal vaccine.
“We’ve got messages out to suppliers,” she said.
Janis Goedeke, health officer with the Crawford County Health Department, said her department also is out of seasonal flu vaccine.
She said part of the reason for the shortage is that the vaccinations began earlier than they have in past years.
“We are expecting more at the end of November,” Goedeke said.
Asked if she was confident of that, Goedeke laughed.
“I’m not confident of anything this year,” she said.
Maggie Thompson, spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said a shortage of seasonal flu vaccine has been reported statewide. She said the greater demand because of increased interest and earlier availability has created the shortage.
She said there is hope that more vaccine will arrive. “Some of it might start flowing,” she said.
Thompson said the H1N1 vaccine is continuing to trickle in to the state and to the county health departments, a little more each week.
The Cherokee County Health Department is making the swine flu vaccine available by appointment only to county residents in target groups. The groups are: pregnant women; people who live with or provide care for infants younger than 6 months; children from 6 months to age 9; children and adolescents ages 10-18 who have chronic medical conditions; and health care and emergency medical workers. To schedule an appointment, people may call 620-429-3087 or 888-405-5323.
The Crawford County Health Department currently is targeting children in schools with its H1N1 vaccine, Goedeke said.
Kansas statistics
Maggie Thompson, spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said that from September 2008 through May 2009, seasonal influenza was a direct cause of death for five Kansans, while pneumonia with flu as a contributing factor killed 1,143 during that period. So far, H1N1 has killed 14 Kansas residents. Most of them had underlying health problems.
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Kansas health departments out of seasonal flu vaccine
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