U.S. health officials said Friday 3.4 million doses of H1N1 flu vaccine are expected to be available the first week of October.
Jay Butler, a medical epidemiologist and chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s H1N1 vaccine task force, said most of these initial doses of H1N1 vaccine will be the nasal spray form, which is not recommended for pregnant women, people age 50 and older, or those with asthma, heart disease or other chronic diseases. The first doses will primarily be given to healthcare workers.
We would anticipate that once we’re up and going we should be seeing at least 20 million new doses of vaccine weekly going right on into December after when we would hope to reach the capacity of having delivered 195 million doses,
Butler said at a news conference.
Right now there’s every indication that we have a good match between the virus that’s causing disease and the vaccines we have to be able to prevent it.
Availability of the vaccine may vary, Butler said.
The H1N1 flu is in all 50 states, but is more prevalent in some areas such as the Southeast and is mainly hitting children and young adults, Butler said.
Most of the illness, appears to be moderate or moderately severe,
Butler said.
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