After a long delay and despite little communication with suppliers, Health Services received a shipment of flue vaccines Thursday - in time to hold a clinic after Thanksgiving Break.
Health Services Medical Director Margaret Higham said the shipment will add to the 160 doses left over from the 300 ordered for a high-risk vaccination clinic held Wednesday. The first general clinic will be held Nov. 30.
The doses that arrived Thursday were only a small part of the 5,000 doses Health Services has ordered from two suppliers. "If we continue to get more vaccine (which we are very hopeful of), we will then schedule a clinic for faculty and staff, " Higham wrote in an e-mail.
Higham said under better conditions the clinic would be held between the last week in October and the first two weeks of November, but this year is better than last. Last year one of the leading producers of the vaccine, Chiron Corp., was forced to suspend all production because British authorities detected contamination in the product.
According to Higham, the shutdown let to a nationwide shortage, and Tufts did not receive any vaccinations. Last month Chiron announced it would not meet its manufacuring goals.
Higham said the problem is both the difficulty of making the vaccine and the fact that few companies make it. The vaccine takes nine months to make and involves "a tight deadline and companies don't make too much money on it," Higham said.
To try to guarantee an adequate supply this year, Health Services ordered 5,000 doses last spring - up from 2,500 last year. "We like to be able to offer [the] vaccine to any student or staff/faculty member who wants it, " Higham said.
The two producers have been unwilling to provide Health Services with definitive information about the arrival of the vaccines. "They're not communicating with us," Higham said. "That's part of our problem."
Students should be able to get adequate protection against the flu, which usually hits in January but sometimes in February.
If the vaccine is administered too early it can be ineffective, Higham said. "If the flu hits late, you may not have adequate protection if you received [the] vaccine in early fall," she said.
Regardless of when Health Services gets the vaccine, Higham said it is recommended to get vaccinated. "You never know when you're going to be exposed," she said.
