City Needs Flu Vaccines for 600,000
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The city needs to lay its hands on 600,000 more flu vaccines to take care of the more than 1.1 million New Yorkers who are over 65 or who are chronically ill and could die from this year’s influenza outbreak, Mayor Bloomberg and the city’s top physician said yesterday.
That is why Mr. Bloomberg and the commissioner for health and mental hygiene, Thomas Frieden, asked employers and health-care providers to donate any extra vaccine they have to help the city inoculate those who stand to suffer the most from the flu this winter.
“There are several companies that have come forward with some vaccines and we have a request in for 600,000 doses from the federal government,” Dr. Frieden said yesterday. “The highest need areas are the city’s nursing homes that have the potential of an outbreak.”
Dr. Frieden said there are about 20 million doses of the vaccine that are to be distributed from the one manufacturer still producing the shot. Nationally, about 3 million doses a week are going out, he said. He said he thinks New York may not get the shots it needs all at once, but, by the time the flu season hits, everyone who needed a shot should be able to get one.
There is enough vaccine, contrary to earlier reports, for babies who need shots, Dr. Frieden said. The shortages apply only to the adult vaccines. Children between 6 months and 23 months of age should get the vaccine, he said.
“The infant vaccine is a different vaccine and there is no shortage of that,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “The problem is those who are most at risk. There are enough vaccines to take care of them in this city, but some people who aren’t in those categories are getting vaccinated and it is not available for those in the other categories. You need to give up your opportunity to get a shot to give it to those who need it a lot more.”
Healthy adults forgoing the vaccine this year will be able to get a flu mist to help combat the illness. That medication should appear in pharmacies and doctors’ offices in coming weeks, officials said. Most New Yorkers who have a private physician should wait until they can get their vaccines there, Mr. Bloomberg said. The long lines outside the city’s health clinics and outside senior centers are for people who aren’t insured or don’t have another avenue through which to get the shots, he said.
“There are doctors with vaccines,” Dr. Frieden said. “The challenge is going to be to distribute the vaccines as equally as possible.”
Mr. Bloomberg’s mother, who lives in Massachusetts and had been having trouble getting a shot, finally was vaccinated yesterday, Mr. Bloomberg said.