UK - Vaccine Priority Groups

Healthy children and over 65s are not swine flu vaccine priority

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/swine-flu/6023403/Healthy-children-and-over-65s-are-not-swine-flu-vaccine-priority.html

This differs from the US plan.

The first vaccinations will begin in Britain in October and first in line will be the 4.77million people aged between six months and 65-years who have underlying health conditions.

They will be followed by pregnant women, people who live with patients with compromised immune systems such as those with leukaemia and then people aged over 65 with underlying health conditions like heart disease. Some 2.1 million frontline health and social care workers will be vaccinated at the same time.

...it is surprising that healthy children are not being prioritised as they are considered 'super-spreaders' of flu and a second wave of the disease is expected once schools have returned in the autumn. Seventeen per cent of the 44 deaths have been in children aged under 15 and they have been ten times more likely to contract the H1N1 virus than the elderly. Despite this, Government officials have decided to only vaccinate children who have underlying health conditions such as cystic fibrosis and asthma.

In America, everyone aged between six months and 24-years, has been put on the priority list to have the two-dose vaccine once it is available. Prof David Salisbury, head of immunisation at the Department of Health said in America the policy was focused more on reducing transmission of the disease while British officials want to concentrate preventing severe illness and deaths. He added that most healthy children suffered a mild to moderate flu and made a full recovery.

However, Sir Liam Donaldson, the Chief Medical Officer, said there had been an increase in the proportion of swine flu deaths in healthy people. Of the eight swine flu deaths confirmed last week, five were in healthy people. A fifth of swine flu deaths have now been in healthy people.

Michael Skinner, a viriologist at Imperial College London, said that officials would have taken a cautious approach to vaccinating children in order to avoid a public backlash like the one encountered following the scare over the safety of the MMR vaccine.

It is not known yet whether all pregnant women will be offered the vaccine or only those in the second or third trimester when the risks associated with swine flu are greatest. This will be decided by the European Medicines Agency when the vaccines are licensed.

There will be some concern that the H1N1 vaccine will be given to children under the age of three even though tests have not been carried out in this age group.

However, Prof Salisbury, a paediatrician, said: "These are children who have got serious medical conditions whose conditions would made very much worse if they got flu. The balance is very strong even though we don't have the data for under threes."

Sir Liam said the children in question would have conditions like cystic fibrosis 'whose lives might be threatened by flu'.

(hat tip Avian Flu Diary)