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Flu shots fall short |
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Written by Sherri Gallant Lethbridge Herald
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Monday, 21 December 2009 |
An H1N1 vaccination clinic in Lethbridge today (Tuesday) from 2 to 4 p.m. is likely the last one of 2009, but the province has fallen far short of its goal to immunize 70 per cent of Albertans against the pandemic strain of influenza.
A third wave of illness is expected to circulate in the New Year, but public health officials have said it could be either dramatically lessened or even eliminated if enough people were immunized.
“We want to keep reminding people to not lower their guard — to continue to do all the things they can to protect themselves. Practice respiratory etiquette (sneeze and cough into your sleeve) and wash your hands, because influenza season isn’t over,” said Dr. Paul Schnee, Medical Officer of Health in the south zone at Medicine Hat.
To date, 1,148,000 Albertans have received the vaccine, 92,755 of them in the south zone — about one third of the population (those eligible for the vaccine do not include babies younger than six months).
“First thing in the New Year there will be some meetings held to determine the schedule and type of clinics to be held in the New Year,” Schnee said.
“That hasn’t been determined yet but certainly the people involved in the planning at the provincial and zone levels will be looking at it first thing in the New Year. It will be based a bit on what’s being observed about what viruses are circulating.
“Right now the seasonal influenza virus is taking a break. It’s interesting how things work in nature, but this is a well-known phenomenon that when a new virus moves in, the pandemic H1N1 in this case, it crowds out the regular ones. But I don’t believe they have gone away, and spring can be a big part of our influenza illness. So we’re not out of the flu season at all.”
The vaccine is now available to all Albertans six months of age and older. Influenza assessment centres that had been set up around the province have all been closed.
The AHS website reports that 65 people in Alberta have died from the H1N1 virus since the pandemic was declared last spring. More than 1,200 have been hospitalized because of the virus, 160 of them in southern Alberta.
“Certainly, in my opinion, influenza illness is going to be with us for three or four months yet,” said Schnee.
“Influenza is a bad disease. Talk to people who have got it and they’ve been really sick. Anybody who has had it, if you ask them if they’d want it again, they’d say absolutely not.”
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