Graphic by Kevin Black

Free H1N1 vaccinations are being offered with no appointment at seven locations in the San Luis Obispo area this week. Health officials said students and citizens should still get vaccinated because knowledge of H1N1 and its characteristics is incomplete, so a vaccination is a cautionary measure.

“The public’s interest has decreased somewhat,” said Michelle Shoresman, emergency preparedness program manager for the San Luis Obispo health agency. “It is still really important for people to get vaccinated. We saw the wave of initial cases back in April and May and it slowly spread after that … but it’s entirely possible we could have another wave.”

The free shots are provided by the federal government, in an effort to prevent further outbreaks and to fulfill previously high citizen demand, Shoresman said. The shots will be given at two locations in San Luis Obispo and Paso Robles and at one location in Templeton, Grover Beach and Arroyo Grande.

Shoresman said during the initial outbreak there were shortages across the county and the nation. The shortages resulted in priority vaccinations that were given to more vulnerable people, such as pregnant women and seniors. Now there is a surplus of vaccinations.

“(There is) enough vaccine for anyone who wants it,” Shoresman said.

Dr. Marty Bragg, director of Health and Counseling Services at Cal Poly, said about 2,200 H1N1 vaccinations were given by the Health Center in the four-day clinic, but not all the doses were used. About 200 are still left for interested students. Students can walk in between 8 and 11 a.m. and 2 and 4 p.m. or make an appointment.

“College students feel like they’re bullet-proof from a vaccine standpoint,” Bragg said.

The Health Center only administers about 500 normal flu shots to students annually.

“College students are very healthy, but there is something about this flu that seems to attack a younger portion of the population and this, in particular, is still worrisome,” he said.

But some students are still ambivalent, Bragg said. He mentioned a busy lifestyle and rumors about the vaccination causing complications as reasons why some students didn’t get the shot.

Material engineering senior Andrew Walker said getting vaccinated is a good idea but because he didn’t personally hear about or see any cases, he didn’t worry about it.

“It’s hard to justify why I wouldn’t get vaccinated,” Walker said. “I guess I was just preoccupied with my life and didn’t get it. I didn’t have any experiences where H1N1 affected my day-to-day life. You hear about it, but you hear about a lot of things that don’t affect you.”

In San Luis Obispo, there have been two deaths and 44 hospitalizations attributed to H1N1, according to a Jan. 26 public health information update released by the San Luis Obispo health agency.

For more information, go towww.slopublichealth.org or call the public health agency at 805-788-2903.

Stock Photo

After the two-week vaccine drive at the Health Center about 4,000 of the 7,000 vaccines will be given back to the county for redistribution. The vaccines will be given to other priority populations including children. The school districts of San Luis Obispo County are preparing to give the vaccine to children. The County Health Agency is assessing the needs of the population and distributing vaccines where necessary according to needs. Cal Poly need for the vaccine has decreased.

“We are discontinuing it because the demand for it has fallen,” Dr. Martin Bragg, the director of Health and Counseling Services said.

With early expectations the Health Center had ordered more than necessary.

The Health Center received an additional 3,500 vaccines on Nov. 10, the second of two shipments expected from the county.

“We originally ordered 19,000. We thought we might have to give everyone two shots,” Bragg said.

Bragg said that officials were unsure if recipients would require two doses of the vaccine. With 19,000 vaccines he thought they would be able to serve the populations who wanted the vaccine and give them two doses.

The County Health Dept. only allotted 7,000 of the 19,000 requested vaccines for Cal Poly.

After receiving the vaccine Health Center officials organized a vaccine drive, which began Nov. 3. The Health Center closed normal operations and was only open to give the vaccine. The vaccine was also offered Nov. 4,5,10 and 12.

During those dates Health Center officials hoped to administer 1,000 vaccines per day of the vaccine drive.

The first day it was offered, about 750 vaccines were given.  There was a line out the Health Center door down to Perimeter Road of students waiting to receive it. The second day, about 500 were given, and the third day, over 200.

“Those who didn’t get it (the vaccine) have in a sense decided that the risk isn’t worth the shot,” Bragg said. “I am a little disappointed that we didn’t give more vaccines.”

The next big push to vaccinate will be in kindergarten through 12th grade schools, which is one of the places getting vaccines . The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that the initial target groups for the vaccine included people aged from six months to 24 years of age. The extra vaccines collected from Cal Poly will be going to these groups beginning in the public schools.

The San Luis Obispo Public Health Department and County Office of Education sent packets home with children starting Nov. 2 with information and consent forms.

In a release from the San Luis Obispo County Health Agency and Office of Education, health officer Dr. Penny Borenstein said, “Vaccination is the best way to prevent the spread of influenza in schools throughout the community.”

The release asked parents who wished for their children to be vaccinated to return the required permission slip as soon as possible. The dates for the vaccinations are uncertain, but they do not expect the Public Health school vaccinations to start until Nov. 10. The program will begin in elementary schools and then include middle and high schools as more vaccines become available.

The vaccine is becoming more available and more widely spread. According to the CDC, “The federal government has purchased a total of 250 million doses of 2009 H1N1 vaccine. The 2009 H1N1 vaccine first became available in early October, and more doses are becoming available every week.”

The H1N1 vaccine is still available at the Health Center and will be offered during regular business hours.

“As more vaccine becomes available, we hope to ensure that every person who wants a vaccine can receive one,” Borenstein said in the release.

For county updates, visit slocounty.ca.gov/health/publichealth/swineflu.htm or call the 24-hour Public Health information line at 805-788-2903. More information can be found at  afd.calpoly.edu/ehs/h1n1 or on the Health Center’s H1N1 hotline at 805-756-6099.

Graphic by Kevin Black

Over 90 percent of flu cases have been reported as H1N1. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said this number could possibly be as high as 99 percent of cases. With these numbers many facilities are no longer been testing specifically for H1N1 but are assuming and providing treatment for it. The Health Center does not have any totals of individuals infected for this reason. Students watch their peers become sick and await the arrival of the vaccine.

However, there are steps that must be taken before students can receive the vaccine. This begins with obtaining the necessary funding for production.

The Obama administration and Congress have allotted nearly $10 billion for the H1N1 vaccinations. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Web site federal funding is for the purchase of the H1N1 vaccine and the states are receiving funding for vaccination efforts from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.

After funding was provided the vaccine was developed by five companies. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services listed CSL Biotherapies, MedImmune, Novartis, sanofi Pasteur and GlaxoSmithKline as the companies. GlaxoSmithKline was the only company who failed to receive approval from the FDA.

Once the developers have the vaccine approved it must be distributed to the nation depending on supply and demand.

Michelle Shoresman, Emergency Preparedness Program Manager from the Health Department, said the San Luis Obispo County Health Department began receiving early shipments of the vaccine in the beginning of October. These were small amounts of the vaccine, which were given to a few pediatricians. They received the first installments of their orders, as they are at the top of the priority list.

“We are hoping to receive around 40,000 doses around the end of October,” Shoresman said. According to the U.S. Census Bureau as of 2008 there were 265,297 people in San Luis Obispo County. “We are at the whim of distribution process for receiving the vaccination.”

Although there are two types of the vaccine being offered the Health Center will only receive the type delivered by injection. The injection contains a dead strain of the virus and is said to be slightly more effective. However, for pregnant women, children between six months and two years and adults over 49 must receive the vaccination through a shot. One shot will be sufficient for all except children between six months and two years.

The people who have received the vaccine already have not shown adverse reactions that can be isolated and concluded to be a result of the vaccine.

However, due to the pressing issue the clinical trials for H1N1 were done on thousands of people. Rare side effects might not have shown up in the population tested.

Shari Roan of HealthandSurvival.com brings up the pandemics of the decade and how they relate to our current situation. This reminds some of the swine flu scare of 1976 when days after the vaccine was released it was found to increase the risk of a rare neurological condition called Guillain-Barre syndrome.

This is when the immune system attacks the nervous system and can cause temporary paralysis and can be fatal. Ever since the resulting deaths resulting people have become leery of vaccines. Roan also said that about 500 people developed the syndrome and 25 of them died.

This was shown recently in comments. Talk show host Bill Maher wrote on Twitter that anyone who received the vaccine were “idiots.” He also said he “did not believe that healthy people were vulnerable to dying from the new H1N1 virus.”

Linda Bergthold of the Huffington Post said, “Maher said he didn’t think pregnant women needed to get the vaccine. He is WRONG. Lives could be lost over this unscientific “opinion” of Bill Maher.”

His statement also contradicts the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s release, which said people between the ages of five and 24 are “particularly vulnerable” to the flu.

College students are within the top five at risk populations and will receive dosages before people who are not in this list.

The Cal Poly Health Center is expecting to receive the H1N1 vaccine around the end of October or beginning of November. This depends on when the County Health Department receives more of the vaccines from the state. Upon receiving the vaccine the county must analyze and divide the doses based on the demand and actual need for the vaccine and distribute accordingly.

The Health Center requested 19,000 vaccines to meet the needs of all students. There are about 18,000 students that attend Cal Poly. However, the Health Center polled students twice last week and received varying results. In one poll two thirds of students said they intended to get the vaccine while in the second poll three quarters said they did not intend to be vaccinated.

Although they ordered 19,000 vaccines they will only receive 7,000 in the initial distribution from the county.

“We believe that the 7,000 will easily get us through the priority students (ones with existing conditions or high risk students) and the bulk of students who want it,” Director of Health and Counseling Services, Dr. Martin Bragg said. “Our hope is that we can get everyone a shot who wants a shot.”

Health care and emergency medical services personnel are included in the top five populations to receive the vaccine. The Health Center staff will be provided with the vaccine as well. This is similar to the seasonal flu shots provided for staff in the past years.

When the vaccine arrives in the next few weeks 12 to 15 staff members will be administering the vaccine. The training leading up to the release of the vaccine will include mainly “crowd control” due to the paperwork that must be done prior to receiving the vaccine and the crowds they expect at the release of the vaccine.

In order to accommodate the large-scale vaccinations to be administered the Health Center will have to alter operation for about two weeks.

According to the San Luis Obispo County Health Department during the week of Oct. 1-8 there were six hospitalized cases and “at least 37 persons have had PH lab results consistent with infection with the H1N1 virus.”

More than 100 patients were seen at the Cal Poly Health Center with flu-like symptoms Monday.

An e-mail requesting anyone suspected of having the flu not attend classes was sent the same day to all Cal Poly students. The office of the Registrar assured students that by sending an e-mail to instructors prior to classes to be missed the absence would not result in being dropped from classes.

With the increase in the student population for the beginning of fall quarter the cases of H1N1, commonly known as swine flu, have increased significantly since last Friday.

Political science Professor Mike Lather received two e-mails from students who had H1N1.

According to Dr. Martin Bragg, the director of Health and Counseling Services in the Cal Poly Health Center, the vaccine will arrive in about three weeks. It will be provided to the campus entirely through the county and both will be applying similar restrictions to who will be able to receive the vaccination. The vaccine will be free.

“We expect there will not be enough for everyone,” he said. “(There is) vaccine enough for students at high risk for flu.”

The Center for Disease Prevention and Control recommended that the vaccines should be administered in order of the most need due to the initial limited quantities. There are five priority populations who are believed to be at higher risk of contracting H1N1.

The Health Center is asking students who have the symptoms of H1N1 but do not have any other preconditions to stay home and not go to a health care provider unless additional complications arise.

Physics professor Brian Granger said the department is “strongly encouraging us to line drop students due to the budget crunch.” However, with the increase in cases on campus and the Registrar’s request the Physics Department asked their faculty to not drop students who e-mail prior to class about illness.

“As far as I am concerned, if a student is sick for two to three weeks I will work with them,” Granger said. “It is really no different than any other sickness, the students are just more strongly encouraged to stay home.”

The virus is spread mainly through droplets. These droplets come from a sneeze or cough and are left on surfaces. A desk is a very common surface at a university and a number of students rotate through a given desk everyday. According to Bragg it is more likely to be contracted from the droplets on a desk from a previous occupant than a fellow student.

College-aged students have been placed in the top five priority populations. There are many situations at a university in which students are in large groups and this presents a problem due to the contagiousness of the virus.

Bragg said students living on campus who have the flu have been asked to have someone take the student home until they have been fever free for at least 24 hours.

According to the San Luis Obispo County Health Agency, there have been 10 cases of H1N1 hospitalizations and one death in the county.

The Health Center has not tracked the total number of cases.

Human testing of the swine flu vaccine has shown that there are no dangerous side effects, health officials announced yesterday.

The vaccine has been tested on adults within the past few weeks and the greatest side effect, thus far, has been soreness of the arm at the injection site, said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Since adults experienced no harmful side effects, children six months to 17 years old have begun clinical trials as well.

Pregnant women, the group at the highest risk for contracting the virus, have yet to undergo the clinical trials, but are slated to begin in September, Fauci said.

While the vaccine is currently being tested for its safety, studies on how well it prevents against the virus are scheduled to begin next month, Fauci said.

Overall, 4,500 people are to undergo clinical trials of the vaccine, Fauci said.

The fact that the vaccine has not produced any negative side effects is reassuring, yet there are many specifics that remain unknown.

How many people will be affected? Will there be enough vaccine to go around? When exactly will the vaccine it be available?

Questions like these will most likely remain unanswered until the flu season arrives.