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As the first stage of swine flu or H1N1 vaccine crosses the country, more than a third of parents don't want their children get vaccinated, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll. They are quite afraid about the new vaccine's side effects — nothing serious has turned up in tests so far though — while others say swine flu doesn't amount to any greater health threat than seasonal flu. "I will not be first in line in October to get my son vaccinated," a mother said in an interview last month. "We're talking about putting an unknown into him. I can't do that." She said the vaccine is too new and too untested. The AP poll learned that 38 percent of parents said they were unlikely to give permission for their children to be vaccinated at school. The belief that the new vaccine could be risky is one federal health officials have been fighting from the start, and they plan an unprecedented system of monitoring for side effects. They note that swine flu vaccine is... details >>>

Swine flu vaccine first doses are being administered in the United States today, at first targeting health-care workers as the country’s biggest influenza prevention program seeks to slow the pandemic. Among the first to have AstraZeneca Plc’s nasal spray vaccine are doctors and hospital workers in Marion County, Indiana, and Le Bonheur Children’s Medical Center in Memphis, Tennessee. About 600,000 tubes will be shipped by tomorrow, with shots coming later this week totaling 6 million to 7 million doses, said Bill Hall, spokesman for the Health and Human Services Department. Swine flu, or H1N1, is spreading widely in most U.S. states. The first H1N1 vaccines will be targeted at health-care workers, children, pregnant women and people with chronic conditions that put them at risk for complications. While the U.S. has ordered doses to cover all Americans, only half of U.S. adults plan to get the vaccine, according to a Harvard University poll... details >>>

New York will receive its first swine flu vaccine doses next week, with many reserved for health care workers, including those opposed to the state's requirement to get vaccinated. Upstate New York will have about 100,000 doses and New York City will get about 80,000, according to the state Department of Health. Health officials will place orders for the first round of vaccinations Wednesday. "We're going into a third flu season in one calendar year,'' said Dr. Richard Daines, the state commissioner of health. "And there's a lesson there. Every time flu rips through our system it creates harm.'' Priority will be given to those the CDC - Centers for Disease Control's considers at high risk. That includes health care workers, pregnant women, children and young adults and people between ages 25 and 64 who have health conditions that could lead to medical complications from the flu. New York will be getting only the mist vaccine in its first order. That... details >>>

The U.S. government is rushing to deliver H1N1 swine flu vaccine to states on or around Oct. 15. Vaccination likely will take two shots given three weeks apart. No protection is expected until two to four weeks after the second shot - around Thanksgiving for those who start vaccination in mid-October. You are on the front line of this fall's flu fight then. It's going to be up to you to try not to catch the flu. And if you do catch the flu, it's going to be up to you to try not to infect anyone else. It is essential for people to make plans, because U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will not have a vaccine available for a few months. The first part of the plan is to avoid infection: * Wash your hands frequently and thoroughly. Use soap and warm water when available; use hand sanitizer between hand washings. * Avoid close contact with sick people. Close contact means getting within 6 feet of a sick person. If you must care ... details >>>

Finally some good news about swine flu: the Swiss firm Novartis reports today that its pandemic flu vaccine works with only one shot. Half as much dead virus as in regular winter flu shots was needed to give 80 per cent of the adults injected the amount of immune reaction required for ordinary flu vaccines. This is good news. The low dose of virus means more doses can be made in a short time, especially useful as the vaccine viruses are growing slowly. Results from the first swine-flu vaccine trials taking place in Leicester reveal a strong immune response after just one dose. The pilot study, run by the University of Leicester and Leicester Hospitals, was trialled with 100 healthy volunteers, aged between 18 and 50. Dr Iain Stephenson, who led the trial at the Leicester Royal Infirmary, said: "The clinical trial of Novartis MF59-adjuvanted cell-based A (H1N1) vaccine indicates that the "swine flu" vaccine elicits a strong immune response and is... details >>>

US officials say that children might need 2 H1N1 vaccine doses. Tests made with the needle-free Sanofi-Pasteur’s H1N1 vaccine found that children responded to it; however, children aged 10 and over will just need single shot dosage while children 9 years of age might require two shots of the vaccine. Sanofi had gotten Federal government’s order for about 27.3 million additional units of the H1N1 vaccine. According to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) children aged below 9 years will need two doses of the vaccine spaced at 21 days interval. However, he believes other seasonal flu shots could be given same day as the swine flu vaccine. About 25 companies across the world are engaged in making H1N1 vaccine, and US ordered from 5 companies: Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, CSL and MedImmune. US had initially ordered for 195 million units of the vaccine from these ... details >>>

swine flu epidemic LEVEL 5 !!! The 2009 swine flu outbreak is an epidemic that began in April 2009 with a new strain of H1N1 swine influenza virus. It is also referred to as Mexican flu, swine-origin influenza, or 2009 H1N1 flu. The outbreak is beli... details >>>