States Revise Vaccine Expectations

[indigo girl]

Although we are getting reports that smaller than anticipated deliveries of the swine flu vaccine are scheduled to begin next week, the mere fact that we have any vaccine delivered just 5 months after the isolation of this virus should be viewed as quite an accomplishment.

That's a month sooner than most experts would have predicted six months ago.

And we would probably all be celebrating that fact had we not heard early, overly optimistic estimates of the quantities of vaccine that we could expect to see delivered this month.

Originally, back in July, we were told that we could see as many as 120 million doses of vaccine in mid-October. That number was `downsized' in August to about 45 million doses (see Revised Vaccine Estimates From NBSB Meeting).

Now, it appears that goal is in doubt as well.

Of course, vaccine manufacturing has always been fraught with uncertainties, and so coming up short of these early `best case projections' isn't terribly surprising. This is something I've explored several times in the past, including an essay entitled The Plan And The Challenge back in May of this year.

Most of the `early vaccine' delivered this month will be in the form of Flumist, which is only appropriate for healthy children and adults aged 2-49. Those who are pregnant, or fall into other high risk medical categories, are going to have to wait a bit longer for the shot.

Commentary continued here: http://afludiary.blogspot.com/2009/10/states-revise-vaccine-expectations.html