Plan to boost flu vaccination rates

With about three-quarters of the nation's population already on the priority list to receive an annual flu shot, it might not be long before the recommendation applies to everyone. If more people do heed the call to get vaccinated, they might be more successful this year. If all goes according to plan, there should be more vaccine to go around.

Of course, as production and distribution problems have plagued flu shots over the past few years, more than a few physicians are skeptical that this year will be any better.

But because there could be as many as 120 million doses of vaccine available this season, compared with 80 million doses last season, attention is shifting to how to use those additional doses, said Nicole Smith, PhD, MPH, a member of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Influenza Branch. She spoke at a May 18 briefing on the upcoming flu season that was sponsored by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases in collaboration with several federal agencies and the AMA.

The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices is planning to discuss this topic at its June 29-30 meeting, Dr. Smith said.

AMA Trustee Ardis D. Hoven, MD, also speaking at the briefing, noted that the immunization rate among health care workers, long a priority group for vaccination, is particularly in need of a boost. Only about 40% of physicians said they had been vaccinated the previous season.

She also urged physicians and others to continue to offer immunizations throughout the flu season. Often vaccination rates drop dramatically after Thanksgiving, she said, although flu generally doesn't peak until February.

One way to avoid the entire problem of an annual vaccine would be to develop a universal influenza vaccine that could be administered just once and provide immunity to the unchanging features of the virus, said George Curlin, MD, MPH, the medical officer for the Office of the Director at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Dr. Curlin oversees vaccine clinical trials.

"If we had a universal vaccine, there wouldn't be this race against time every year," he said.

Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2006/06/12/hlbf0612.htm.