Flu Vax On Our Town

[Old Hawk]

Today is the statewide mass vax effort here with free drive through for both seasonal and H1N1 shots. The latter will be limited and only available for 6 mos to 5 yrs kids and pregnant women.

One of the grandmothers of my 3 yr old great grand daughter took her to the center a full half hour before the opening time of 7:00 AM. The idea was to get her the H1N1 shot and get away so Grandma could get to work.

At 9:00 AM Grandma called from her car. She was locked into the slowly moving line of cars, no where near to the end, and could not possibly get out of the line. Her boss was furious. She is the dispatcher for a critical medical transportation service.

At 10:00 AM she called again and the situation had not improved. She said traffic was backed up in every direction as far as she could see. The center is on a major route through and around the city. All available police are trying to deal with the traffic and unavailable for anything else.

At 10:30 AM DD called me to report that traffic was jammed everywhere in the entire city because of this and warned me to not even think of trying to get to town today. She is trying to find a way to get to her own office where she has appointments scheduled all day, some of them for urgent treatments.

Arkansas has been praised for our mass vax program which in the past has been highly successful, rated first in the nation. I suspect what we are seeing here will be true over the whole state.

The cost to businesses and personal income will be enormous. The lack of normal critical and emergency services will endanger many. Perhaps this is more of a threat to life than the flu itself.

Emergency planners will be writing a new chapter for their procedures.

OH

[CanadaSue]

Unintended consequences.

I hope other locales are monitering these early clinic horror stories & amending plans. Ya had to know it would happen - but this is to a far larger extent than I would have imagined.

Imagine the complete chaos if we were dealing with H5N1?

[Old Hawk]

Update......

Grandma was in the line for 3 1/2 hours and was informed there would be at least another hour wait. She found a way to get out of the line so she could go to work. The wee one didn't get the vax.

Next day's paper confirmed that traffic across the central part of the city was snarled throughout the day.

Health care workers report they gave out nearly 4,000 shots of vaccine but didn't indicate the number of those that were for H1N1.

One thing that slowed the process was that, unlike seasonal vax, the H1N1 vax could only be administered by an RN. I find this strange as we are constantly told this is the same vaccine base we have used for years.

Another slow down factor was the form that had to be completed. I obtained a copy, it covers both sides of a legal size paper.

Future clinics will be announced if and when more vaccine is available.

OH

[Exodia]

Originally Posted by Old Hawk

One thing that slowed the process was that, unlike seasonal vax, the H1N1 vax could only be administered by an RN.

I believe one of the reasons several cities have declared emergencies was to help get around some of the regulations about who could administer vaccines.

[Kassy]

Originally Posted by Old Hawk

Arkansas has been praised for our mass vax program which in the past has been highly successful, rated first in the nation.

...

Emergency planners will be writing a new chapter for their procedures.

OH

Is this the way they do the seasonal vaccine round each year?

The response was clearly overwhelming, maybe they should have anticipated a bigger response given the current situation?

[Old Hawk]

It could have been better organized too. Traffic control should have been in place before opening, not after disaster.

Volunteers could have been walking up the car lines getting the paperwork started.

But, to be fair, I don't think anyone could have guessed in advance which way this would go. A lot of people have declared they won't get it.

OH