Playing the swine flu blues

Thousands want protection from H1N1, but county’s shot stockpile remains slim

By Christian Gaston

The Forest Grove News-Times, Oct 28, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Chase Allgood / News-Times

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Two weeks ago, health officials in Washington County and beyond were expecting a torrent of swine flu vaccine. But the windfall hasn’t arrived.

And now, it seems, the trickle may mean vaccine orders won’t be completely fulfilled until early next year.

Washington County officials say they’ve received less than half of the vaccine they ordered, and have postponed free vaccination clinics across the county.

“We were making plans based on what the (Center for Disease Control) said was expected and then all of a sudden we get numbers that were significantly lower than what was expected,” said Scott Porter, emergency manager for Washington County.

On Halloween, county officials will open up the doors of Tom McCall East Upper Elementary School in Forest Grove and Sherwood High School in Sherwood to offer vaccines.

But the doses available at Tom McCall have been cut from 1,000 to 700 because of the dwindling supply from vaccine manufacturers. Seven clinics planned by the county have been postponed.

“It's frustrating that we don’t have vaccine to deliver and we’ve been working for months to deliver the vaccine,” Porter said.

The problem lies with the way the H1N1 seed strain, provided to drug manufacturers in May, grew inside a chicken egg.

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