Piedmont Hospital out of seasonal flu vaccine for workers

By Shelia M. Poole

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Officials at Piedmont Hospital say they have run out of seasonal flu vaccine for its employees.

The hospital, which is located on Peachtree Road, ordered 2,500 doses of the vaccine from its vaccine supplier, but has received just 1,550 doses.

The hospital may not get additional vaccine until November, “and of course that will be in the midst of flu season,” said Brent Price, corporate director of infection control at Piedmont Healthcare. “It takes several weeks to build immunity. People won’t be protected until well into December.”

Although much of the public’s attention has focused on novel H1N1, also called swine flu, seasonal flu can result in a large number of deaths and illnesses.

Most cases of swine flu have been mild to moderate. So far, there have been nine deaths and 238 hospitalizations in Georgia.

In the past year or so, Piedmont hospitals have been on a campaign to encourage employees to take the seasonal vaccine. “This is a terrible detriment to that,” he said.

The hospital employs about 3,800 workers at the Peachtree Road site. Officials did not order that much vaccine because only about 42 percent of employees typically take the vaccination, said Talei Akahoshi, director of occupational health at Piedmont Healthcare.

Donna Cary, a spokeswoman for Sanofi Pasteur, the vaccine division of French drugmaker Sanofi-Aventis, can’t speak specifically about Piedmont. However, “this season is not without its production challenges,” she said in a statement. “The seasonal influenza vaccine is produced from three strains of influenza virus. One of them, the B-strain, was low yielding this year. Additionally, the company is working to make a vaccine for H1N1.

“As a result, we can anticipate that the shipment of remaining doses of seasonal vaccine could extend a few weeks longer than initially anticipated. That is, instead of having all doses shipped by the end of October, the final shipment of doses may occur in November.”

She said the company has shipped more than half of the seasonal vaccine, and shipments are continuing.