First shipments of swine flu vaccine reach LI (What a coincidence it contains live flu virus)

By RIDGELY OCHS
Newsday
Oct. 06, 2009

Do you see what they did here? They are openly going to give everyone the live virus under the guise of fighting the flu, this is going to turn these hospitals into incubation chambers. - ChrisBoth Nassau and Suffolk's health departments and at least one Long Island hospital got their first shipments of the swine flu vaccine Monday - 1,000 doses each.

The counties are targeting high-risk groups determined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: healthy people between the ages of 2 and 24 and those up to age 49 who are caregivers of children under 6 months old.

The first shipments include only the live flu vaccine delivered in a nasal mist, which pregnant women and children between 6 months and age 2 should not take. Those groups will be given priority when the second vaccine shipment - which is expected to include vaccine delivered by a shot - arrives later in October, the state health department said.

In Nassau, more than 600 doctors have registered with the state to get the H1N1 vaccine. Nassau Health Commissioner Dr. Maria Torroella Carney said the county would target pediatricians on the list for this first shipment. Which pediatricians and how much each would receive still had to be figured out, she said Monday.

Toni Dodici, office manager for Garden City pediatrician Dr. Anthony Battista, said she has been getting "lots of calls" about the vaccine. Her boss, she said, had requested 1,250 doses.

In Suffolk, they will go to the county's 10 health centers and to pediatricians and primary care doctors who request it, said health department spokeswoman Grace McGovern.

One of North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System's hospitals also got a 1,000-dose shipment of the H1N1 vaccine. Spokesman Terry Lynam declined to name the hospital because he said the system hasn't figured out yet how it was going to allocate the doses and officials didn't want people showing up to demand them.

It was not clear whether other Long Island hospitals had gotten any vaccine.

The state health department said the CDC expects 3.5 million doses of the vaccine to be available nationwide this week, 91,000 of which are going to New York State. The state is to get between 15 million and 17.5 million doses, the department said.