Flu Vaccine

Dutch2

I just heard on the radio, had the Cardinal/Dodger game on, and the news following the game announced that the availability of the flu vaccine for this winter has been cut in half due to a problem with a manufacturer in England. This will not go over well here as we always provide free flu shots for all of our employee each year.
Dutch2

System

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 10-06-04 AT 08:05AM (CST)[/font][br][br]First, do you know that your firm will not get the vaccine? Or maybe will be getting a reduced supply?

Do all of your employees take the shot? Perhaps you can still give it to those employees in the high risk category. You'll have to come up with some kind of campaigne to explain the cut back where the other employees will 'understand'. We have clinics here that offer the shot for $10. Maybe your firm can subsidize the cost for the other employees to go to the clinic.

Dutch2

We have always used the local County Health Dept. I have talked with the Health Dept. this morning and this particular supplier is the one they were using for all of their vaccine. At this point our County Health Dept. states that it looks like they will not be able to provide flu vaccines to anyone at all; at least for over a month. I have advised our troops of this and that if they feel they are in the high risk group they should contact their personal physician to attempt to make arrangements.
Good luck,
Dutch2

marc

A follow-up story on Fox this A.M. said the CDC was considering diluting the shots to turn one into two. They were also suggesting the shots get prioritized to go to the elderly and other high risk people. Finally, they do have a stockpile in inventory for just this sort of emergency that they are considering releasing.

This will take some maturing before we get the whole story.

Dasher

Yes, the provider I use told me about this situation before it hit the news, and so I locked in for enough for our company. However, I am living in fear that any day he will call me and say sorry, he can not get what we need. If that happens, we will just have to be selective in allowing the higher risk people to have the vaccine that is available.

dixied

Our provider called us yesterday and informed us they were having to cancel out of our Nov. 2nd date. Their entire supply was coming from the England company.
We have provided free flu shots for employees, dependents and retirees for the past several years.
We immediately notified everyone, esp. the retirees.
Hopefully, they will find more vaccine.

sonny

Our provider cancelled this a.m. Many unhappy employees, but what are you going to do? If ee are in a group that can get shots or otherwise obtain one, we will reimburse.

System

We just canceled flu shots but will reimburse up to $12.

What really frosts my shorts is that there seems to be a shortage of flu shots every year. Whatever happened to the law of supply and demand? Someone in the vaccine-making business could ramp up supply and make a profit. If so many people can start up meth labs in their basement, maybe I should start up a flu-vaccine lab at home ... :-?

James Sokolowski
HRhero.com

mcmel

There have been 8 categories of people designated in this area who will be able to get the vaccine; others have to do without. The categories include babies up to 23 months, asthmatics, pregnant women, elderly people, etc.

I've never received the flu vaccine and have actually heard that people who get it seem to get sicker, (in some cases). Isn't it fairly new, (like the chicken pox vaccine)? How many of you have had it?

mushroomHR

I get a flu shot every year and have never had a problem. Wonder if I can qualify this year as one of the "elderly", hmmmmmm :-?

Hunter1

We actually have our annual supply already delivered, and employees signed up. I did an email to all concerned and asked employees not in a high risk category to voluntarily take their name off the list. We plan on giving the remainder to our county health department which will distribute it to elderly and other high risk individuals. I told employees right away that I didn't want to know why they considered themselves in a high risk group, just leave their name on the list. So far, we've had about 20% take their name off the list.

marc

Good idea Hunter - you get the good Samaratin award.