With shipments of the H1N1 flu vaccine arriving daily, Missouri state health officials today encouraged local health departments to begin offering the vaccine to anyone who requests it.
The new policy will make the vaccine available for the first time to seniors and other healthy adults. Until now, limited supplies of the vaccine forced local health departments to restrict the vaccine to groups that were hardest hit by the new flu strain, including infants, children and pregnant women.
Margaret Donnelly, director of the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, said health officials would continue their efforts to vaccinate more pregnant women and young people. But increasing supplies of vaccine throughout Missouri now make it prudent to offer the vaccine to other groups as well.
“With 1.26 million doses of vaccine shipped to Missouri, we know that the people most at risk have had the opportunity to be vaccinated and many are now protected from the effects of the H1N1 flu,” Donnelly said. “The success of this targeted vaccination effort is now allowing us to extend the distribution of the vaccine to the general population.”
The H1N1 flu emerged in Mexico last March. It spread to the United States in April and was declared a worldwide outbreak in June, becoming the fastest spreading pandemic on record.
The H1N1 virus has become the dominant strain of flu throughout the United States. In Missouri, it represents at least 90 percent of the flu cases reported in the current flu season, which began Oct. 4. The highly contagious strain has caused the number of flu cases to skyrocket.
In the first eight weeks of the current flu season, physicians reported 26,307 cases of flu in Missouri. In the first eight weeks last year, they reported 56.
Unlike seasonal flu, the new virus has also disproportionately afflicted young people. Just less than half of Missouri’s flu cases have occurred in children age 5 to 14, which contributed to the 61 school closings so far this school year. Nearly 77 percent of Missouri’s flu cases have been among people 24 years old and younger.
Flu infections peaked in late October, when 6,283 cases were reported in a single week. But health officials warned that flu tends to come in waves and flu season usually peaks in January and February. Therefore, health officials continue to urge people to get vaccinated now, particularly if they have an underlying health problem such as asthma or diabetes that puts them at risk for complications from the flu.
“We appreciate the patience shown by seniors and other adults that allowed us to get the vaccine to the people who needed the protection the most,” Donnelly said. “Seniors make up less than 1 percent of the flu cases reported so far this year and we would like to keep that record intact. So now is the time for everyone to set up a time to get vaccinated against this very contagious flu bug.”
Because the situation can vary across the state, each local health department will decide whether to make the vaccine available to anyone. Some local health departments might continue emphasizing vaccine for young people and adults with chronic health problems if not enough of those groups have been vaccinated in that particular county.
Therefore, Missouri residents should call their local health department to find out about eligibility or to check when a vaccination clinic will be held. A county-by-county schedule of vaccination clinics is available here.
Local health departments provide the H1N1 flu vaccine for free. Private providers may charge a fee for administering the vaccine.