Many are betting last year's shortage and media reports will prompt patients to seek the vaccine this season.
By LISA GREENE
Published September 12, 2004
ST. PETERSBURG - Last year, Bayfront Convenient Care Clinics ran out of flu shots.
So this year, they're joining other doctors across Tampa Bay and trying to make sure their patients can get vaccinated. They've upped their flu shot order by half - even though it has to be thrown away if nobody uses it this season.
"Personally, I would rather trash that vaccine unused than have someone die because they didn't have that vaccine available," said Dr. Nathan Keith Waldrep, medical director of the six Bayfront clinics.
This is the year, many doctors are gambling, that Tampa Bay residents will finally decide that flu shots are important - especially for children. Doctors are betting that memories of last year's shortage of flu shots, as well as media reports of children who died from flu complications, will prompt patients to seek the vaccine.
Across Florida, county health departments have more than doubled their early orders of flu shots for children, from 37,500 to about 100,000. They've increased orders for adult doses by about 13 percent, to about 305,000.
American flu suppliers are making more vaccine - about 100-million shots instead of last year's 83-million.
In the Tampa Bay area, the Bayfront clinics have ordered 6,000 doses instead of last year's 4,000. Pediatric Health Care Alliance, which has 13 offices across Tampa Bay, has done the same, and may open special Saturday hours just for flu shots. St. Petersburg Pediatrics has ordered 30 percent to 50 percent more for its eight Pinellas offices.
"I think people are more interested this year, given (the shortage) last year," said Dr. Marcy Baker, a Tampa pediatrician. "I have been reminding them to call us back in mid September to get their flu shots. I've gotten much less resistance, and I have to spend less time convincing people."
Baker's South Tampa office ordered 750 shots this year after running out with 500 doses last year.
St. Petersburg mom Dana Prodey is among the parents re-thinking flu shots. Her three children - Sarah, 8, and 4-year-old twins Reed and Ryan - have never had flu shots.
"I never thought it was necessary," she said. "It's never been mentioned."
But last year's news reports worried her. And this year, for the first time, the children's pediatrician told her they should get flu shots this fall. This year, they probably will, Prodey said.
Last year, the flu season seemed poised to be disastrous, especially after several children in Colorado died from flu complications. Worried parents surged into pediatricians' offices, and thousands of people suddenly realized that influenza could be a serious disease.
The result: a national shortage of flu shots. In Tampa Bay, some doctors ran out of shots. Others resorted to rationing, saving the shots only for those who were most likely to become seriously ill.
"There was almost a panic situation," said Dr. Stephen Dickey, CEO and medical director of Doctor's Walk-In Clinics, which has eight Tampa Bay offices. "We had people waiting in line outside our clinics to get a flu shot."
In the end, last year's flu season was classed as "moderately severe" - worse than the past few years, but not the epidemic that officials first feared. In Florida, the season was actually milder than usual.
Not everyone thinks people will be clamoring for shots. Dickey ordered slightly fewer shots than his clinic actually used last year - 17,000, instead of nearly 18,000. Even if people got caught up in last year's panic, he said, they probably are less concerned now.
"I think one, the desire to get the flu shot (last year), gets canceled by the fact that they got the flu shot, but there wasn't much flu," he said.
Still, Dickey also plans to order more if he needs it. And he's predicting what he thinks people will do - not what they should do.
"Everybody should get a flu shot every year," he said.
Most health experts agree with Dickey. The irony: If last year's flu season wasn't unusually bad, it's because it always is. Each year, federal officials estimate that 114,000 people are hospitalized because of flu and 36,000 die.
And each year, only a small fraction of those who could get flu shots do.
"I don't believe a lot of people understand how potentially serious the flu can be," said Darrell Pfalzgraf, public health services manager with the Pinellas County Health Department. "A lot of people view the flu as a bad cold."
Like a cold, the flu is caused by a virus. But the influenza virus generally makes people sicker than the common cold. Symptoms include extreme fatigue, fever, headache, body aches, nasal congestion, sore throat and a dry cough. It usually takes a week or two to recover, but people can develop complications, such as bronchitis or pneumonia.
High-risk groups, especially the elderly, are more likely to get the shots, Pfalzgraf said.
"But the general healthy population is far more difficult to encourage," he said.
Part of the problem is that many people have misconceptions about flu shots.
"I think there are a fair number of people who think they can get the flu from the flu shot," Pfalzgraf said.
But in fact, flu shots are made from dead virus, meaning they can't give you influenza. Federal health officials say that people in high-risk groups should get flu shots, and almost anyone else can.
Many health experts believe last year changed many attitudes.
"Medical practitioners are trying to project that there probably will be quite a few people who want to get their flu shots this year," said Bonnie Hebert, spokeswoman for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dr. Lane France, medical director of Pediatric Health Care Alliance, hopes any change will mark a permanent shift, not a one-season panic.
"What we'd like to have happen eventually is for the flu vaccination to become as routine as other vaccinations," he said.
But in the end, it's all a guessing game. The formula for the flu shots changes each year, based on what type of flu health officials think is circulating. That means the shots are only good for one season, and doctors must toss what they don't use.
"We bit the bullet" by increasing their flu shot order by 50 percent, France said. "If we get stuck with it this year, it'll be expensive. But we really feel kids should be immunized."
Others plan to re-order during the season. That's what local health departments did last year, eventually giving out about 80,000 pediatric shots. But even with this year's large initial order, the state will order more as they are needed, said state spokeswoman Jackie DiPietre.
Last week, one of the nation's two flu manufacturers announced that some of its shots were contaminated, delaying delivery of some shipments. That could delay some shipments of shots, but federal officials say that at this point, they don't expect a significant problem.
Because Florida's flu season tends to start later than northern states, most doctors here don't start giving most flu shots until October. So it's too soon to say whether the contamination will delay any shots here, said Joanne Schulte, medical epidemiologist with the state health department.
"Since we're later in the pipeline, we don't know yet if it will have any impact," she said.
But St. Petersburg resident Russ Arsenault won't be taking chances. Last year, his twin daughters' pediatrician ran out of shots, and he was worried until another shipment came in. This year, 8-year-olds Kaley and Brittaney will get vaccinated earlier.
He said he feels so strongly because he still remembers his own bout with the flu in the 1960s.
"I was in bed for two weeks," he said. "It was the worst sickness I've ever had."
