December 12, 2003
Photo: People wait in line to get flu shots at the DuPage County Health Department in Wheaton, Ill., Thursday, Dec. 11, 2003. About 500 waited in line to receive the vaccine, but nearly 100 were turned away when the Health Department ran out of vaccine. Around the nation, health departments and doctors' offices have been so swamped with people looking for a flu vaccine some have exhausted their supplies.(AP Photo/Brian Kersey)
Hundreds of nervous Americans were lining up for their flu shots Friday as government officials urged the public not to panic about the nasty bug that had spread to all 50 states, hitting 24 states hard.
"I think what we're seeing is a natural response to concerns about a serious flu season," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Julie Gerberding said Friday on a television news morning program. "But we also need to remember that for almost everyone, flu is not such a serious disease.
"We don't need to panic or assume that the worst case scenario is going to happen to everyone. Most of us will get through this fine."
The government is scrambling to ship 100,000 adult vaccine doses to combat the shortages, hoping to head off what could become one of the worst flu outbreaks in years, and 150,000 child vaccines are expected in January.
The number of states with widespread infections has nearly doubled to 24 in the past week, and the season has not yet peaked nationally, the CDC said Thursday. Worried parents are rushing to find shots even though many clinics are out or about to run out of the vaccine.
"I really was desperate," said Joy Thompson of Valencia, Calif., who found 300 people waiting to get the vaccine at her daughters' pediatrician's office and couldn't endure the three-hour line. She later got the vaccine from her mother, who is a nurse.
Shivering in coats and under blankets outside the West Oaks Mall in Ocoee, Fla., near Orlando, 300 to 400 people waited for a shot at the remaining free flu vaccines there, even though the flu is not considered widespread in that state.
In Albany, N.Y., and elsewhere, health departments and doctors' offices have been so swamped with people looking for a flu vaccine that some have exhausted their supplies.
Schools have shut down. Emergency rooms have been filled with sick children. And doctors' offices have been forced to turn away droves of people seeking flu shots.
Some experts predict this year's death toll easily could surpass the annual average of 36,000.
Health officials are unsure why the outbreak has hit so early, why it has caused so many problems -- particularly in the West -- and why it seems to be so lethal in children.
States are not required to track the number of flu cases, so the exact total is not clear; however, at least 20 children have died nationwide during this outbreak.
Many cases are never classified as the flu, but doctors say they are seeing a clear increase this year.
"If it were me, I'd be on the phone to your doctor, calling around to see if you could find some" vaccine, said Dr. Randall Todd, Nevada's epidemiologist.
The nation's two producers of flu shots reported last week that they had shipped their entire supply of about 80 million doses. However, Aventis Pasteur had set aside 250,000 doses at the CDC's request last week when it became clear that shortages might develop. Those are the doses being shipped now.
Bianka Ortega, receptionist for After Hours Pediatrics in Las Vegas, has been turning away frustrated parents. The office does have flu vaccines left, but they are reserved for poor patients.
She said parents have been getting "a little bit irate."
Flu vaccine has become scarce in Kentucky, even though there has been no widespread outbreak there so far, after people sought inoculation in droves when flu season hit early.
"This is really unprecedented," said Gwenda Bond, a spokeswoman for the state Cabinet for Health Services. "I don't think there has ever been this high a demand and a vaccine shortage quite like this."
Gerberding said the center is recommending doctors give high-risk groups top priority for shots. That means the elderly, children under 2, those with chronic medical conditions and women in the second and third trimester of pregnancy.
In Colorado, the good news is that the outbreak appears to be on its way out.
"We were certainly inundated with tons of patients" in the last few weeks, said Allison Hamm, spokeswoman for Denver Health Medical Center. "It has certainly slowed down significantly."
Colorado officials said Friday that they should have enough flu vaccine for its most at-risk residents after buying more than 4,000 shots for hard-hit areas.
At least nine children and one 82-year-old woman have died from the flu this season, and 7,600 Coloradans have come down with the virus, health officials said.
Local health officials suspect that at least four other adults have died from the flu. Confirmation from state officials can take months, because they wait for death certificates.
One of the hardest hit communities was Malad, Idaho, a town of about 2,000 people near the Utah state line that virtually shut down in the past week because so many people were ill. Church services and Christmas programs were canceled, as was the wrestling match and drill team show. Even Santa had to postpone his visit with the children.
The CDC said it is unable to know how many children typically die of the flu each year, making it unclear whether this is in fact a particularly lethal outbreak for youngsters.
But anecdotally, this flu season seems to be worse for children, and the CDC plans to watch flu complications among them closely. Flu and its complications are the sixth-leading cause of death nationally among children age 4 and younger, according to the CDC.
Despite the severity of the early outbreak, health experts are not ready to predict just how bad the flu season will be. The season still may peak as early as December, rather than February, which is the norm.
On Thursday, the CDC added Arizona, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island and Virginia to the list of states with widespread flu activity.
Last week, only Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wyoming were on that list.
As for why the West is having the most cases, experts aren't sure.
"I don't have an explanation," said Lisa Jackson, an epidemiologist with the University of Washington. "I don't know if that's just a chance thing or what's going on this year."
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