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Monitoring 27 Million Doses Given
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IMAGE SOURCE: Wikimedia Commons/ Symptoms of swine flu/ author: CDC
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With all of the uncertainty about the new swine flu formulations, a group of independent health advisers will today begin monitoring the safety of the 27 million doses of vaccine being dispensed around the country.
The specially appointed working group is part of the National Vaccine Program Office and experts will confer if they find any problems with inoculation.
"Given the rapidity with which this particular vaccine was rolled out, there seems to be an extra-special obligation to make sure things remain as uncomplicated as they have in the past," Dr. Marie McCormick of the Harvard School of Public Health, who chairs the working group, told the AP.
No one expects any problems to be observed because the swine flu vaccine is made the same way the seasonal flu vaccine except a H1N1 virus is inserted.
In 1976, the last time there was a swine flu epidemic in the U.S., hundreds of reports of Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) were reported as well as hundreds of other side effects.
People who developed it within six weeks of getting a seasonal flu shot should not get any flu vaccine this time around, recommends the CDC.
According to McCormick, there have been no serious adverse events reported from the swine flu vaccine. The primary adverse reports have been sore arms and fever and in some cases symptoms of the flu.
That suggests those people were already infected when they were inoculated, says Bruce Gellin of the National Vaccine Program Office to AP. He says one report of death was due to the swine flu, not the vaccine.
More Monitoring Urged
According to a report in the British medical journal, The Lancet, the monitoring is important to separate normal disease rates from those caused by vaccines - such as 2,500 miscarriages that occur daily in the U.S. and 3,000 heart attacks. No one really knows if they coincide with vaccinations.
Barbara Loe Fisher of the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) has urged that federal officials monitor the vaccination history of children who are sickened or die from swine flu to investigate the impact our increasing schedule of childhood vaccines has on chronic illness such as allergies and susceptibility to adverse effects from the flu vaccine. To date, no one is gathering that information.
If serious complications are observed, federal law, known as the PREP Act (2006 Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act) protects vaccine manufacturers and health officials from lawsuits.
Instead the injured would have to go to the Vaccine injury Compensation Program (VCIP), established by Congress as part of the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 which offered an alternative to vaccine injury lawsuits. Some call it a failed experiment in tort reform.
It was the first acknowledgement that vaccines can cause injury and death and is set up to compensate children or their surviving families harmed by vaccines. A special court is being set up by Health and Human Services officials for the swine flu vaccine in case it’s needed, said spokesman Bill Hall to AP.
Flu season generally lasts until May.
The CDC reports at least 114 children in the U.S. have died as a result, with 19 reported this week, the worst week since the outbreak began in April. About two-thirds of deaths are among children with other health problems. #