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H1N1 in Auglaize County: Swine flu confirmed by health officials who continue to wait for vaccine |
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Thursday, 22 October 2009 |
By KAREN CAMPBELL
Assistant Managing Editor
With one confirmed case in the county and several suspected cases of H1N1, the Auglaize County Health commissioner says they are still waiting for additional vaccine.
Out of privacy concerns for the confirmed county case of H1N1, Health Commissioner Charlotte Parsons said that the patient had been hospitalized and was discharged. She declined to give a city of residence or any other identifying information.
Parsons confirmed Tuesday that approximately 2 to 3 percent of the vaccine requested was received, with that distributed to health care workers, the top priority group. A large portion of the vaccine received was the mist, which cannot be used for pregnant women or those older than 49.
“We’ve received a very small amount of what we asked for and shared that with the hospital, which hasn’t received a shipment yet,” Parsons told the Wapakoneta Daily News. “Healthcare workers are the first ones on the priority list and that’s virtually where all that we received went.
“None has been distributed to the general public yet,” she said. “As soon as we get more injectable vaccine we’ll open it up to more members of the public in priority groups until we get the majority covered.”
Other groups in the the priority populations to receive H1N1 vaccine are children 6 months to 18-years old, those up to age 25, pregnant women, those living in households with babies younger than 6-months old, and those with chronic medical conditions.
“We’re hoping for additional shipments any day now,” Parsons said. “We received an e-mail from the Ohio Department of Health Monday that they placed an order statewide, but we don’t know what our share of that will be.”
One private provider received some vaccine and Parsons said she hopes enough of them receive the vaccine to help get the priority populations immunized without that responsibility falling completely on the Health Department.
Not only is the Health Department waiting on shipments of the H1N1 vaccine, but Parsons said they also still are waiting for shipments of the seasonal flu vaccine to arrive.
“The distributor told us it could be anytime, it could also be the end of November before we receive more,” Parsons said of the seasonal vaccine.
The Auglaize County Health Department ran out of the vaccine during its first and only mass clinic so far of the season. An additional shipment received of pediatric and adolescent vaccines was gone already this week.
“We’ve seen a lot of the flu, with many school-age kids involved,” Parsons said.
“We assume its mostly H1N1, but we’ve only had one case confirmed by the Ohio Department of Health,” she said. “Most of them have not been real severe cases, unless they have underlying chronic medical conditions, which weaken their lungs.”
Specialty labs are required to determine if cases are H1N1. Parsons said while county physicians’ offices have received a few positive tests for type A, they do not keep a tally on that as it does not definitely indicate its H1N1.
Those samples can only be further tested to confirm H1N1 if the patients have been hospitalized or a cluster of cases is identified, Parsons said.
“Right now, the system can’t handle testing everybody and they are behind already,” she said. “I expect the way they are testing to change.”
She urged anyone with a high fever, cough, congestion and other flu symptoms to contact a physician.
If they are severely ill she said they may receive some relief from an antiviral medication if it is administered within 48 hours of the appearance of symptoms.
“Symptoms are the same for H1N1 and the seasonal flu,” Parsons said, noting H1N1 seems to impact the younger population more.
“We’ve received a lot of calls, mostly about the availability of the vaccine,” Parsons said. “It’s frustrating for us as well as them, but we want them to know we will get the message out to them as soon as we get enough vaccine to hold clinics.
“We don’t want to set up a clinic without enough vaccine to cover it,” she said.
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Last Updated ( Friday, 23 October 2009 )
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