As the swine influenza A (H1N1) virus is a new virus, no swine flu vaccine was immediately available to prevent infections.
And unfortunately, the seasonal flu vaccine that many of us receive will not provide any protection against the swine flu virus.
A vaccine has been developed, tested, and now FDA approved and the first doses are arriving at doctor's office and clinics to help prevent infections from the 2009 H1N1 strain of the flu.
Swine Flu Vaccine
Can the swine flu vaccine be combined with the seasonal flu vaccine? No, as vaccine companies had to be done making seasonal flu vaccine before they could get started on the swine flu vaccine.
Who will get the swine flu vaccine?
CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommends that swine flu vaccine should first go to:
- Pregnant women
- Household contacts and caregivers for children younger than 6 months of age
- Healthcare and emergency medical services personnel
- All children and young adults from 6 months through 24 years of age, and
- Persons aged 25 through 64 years who have health conditions associated with higher risk of medical complications from influenza
That will take up about 159 million doses of swine flu vaccine. If supplies of swine flu vaccine are limited, as they now are, priority should go to:
- Pregnant women
- Household contacts and caregivers for children younger than 6 months of age
- Healthcare and emergency medical services personnel
- Children 6 months through 4 years of age, and
- Children 5 through 18 years of age who have chronic medical conditions
Next, as swine flu vaccine improves to the point that all priority groups have gotten vaccinated, everyone from the ages of 25 through 64 years will get vaccinated too. Lastly, people 65 or older, who have the least risk from the swine flu will be offered the swine flu vaccine.
It will be possible to get both a seasonal flu vaccine and the 2009 H1N1 swine flu vaccine at the same time, unless they are both the nasal spray version of the flu vaccine. Instead, kids can get one as a nasal spray and one as a flu shot, or both as flu shots.
And as expected, kids who are nine years old and under will need two doses of the 2009 H1N1 swine flu vaccine separated by at least four weeks to get full protection against the swine flu. Older children, like adults, will need just one dose.
Keep in mind that even if your child was diagnosed with swine flu, unless the diagnosis was confirmed by a real-time reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) test, then they should still get the swine flu vaccine. Most people have not had that test and simply had a rapid flu test in their doctor's office or where diagnosed based on their swine flu symptoms, which is a less certain way to know if you really had 2009 H1N1 swine flu.
Finding Swine Flu Shots
Although five companies are making H1N1 swine flu shots, including Sanofi Pasteur, Novartis, GSK, Medimmune and CSL, doctors won't be able to directly order swine flu vaccine from them. Instead, the federal government is purchasing all of the swine flu shots and then is distributing them via a centralized distribution program. Pediatricians and other health care providers can order swine flu vaccine if they want to receive swine flu vaccine to give their patients.
Parents might also want to ask their pediatrician if they are going to participate in the swine flu distribution program to make sure they have a place to get their kids a swine flu vaccine as they first become available in October.
Although the swine flu vaccine will be free, pediatricians will likely charge a small vaccine administration fee to their patients.
Swine Flu Vaccine Trials
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, has conducted swine flu clinical trials to make sure the new swine flu vaccines are safe and effective. They were conducted at eight university research hospitals and medical organizations across the United States, including Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, and Emory University in Atlanta.
The first clinical trials tested whether one or two doses are needed and will test both 15mcg and 30mcg doses of vaccine. Although the trials started in adults, they were also tested in children.
1976 Swine Flu Vaccine
Although it is true that we don't currently have a swine flu vaccine, there once was a swine flu vaccine that was made to target the swine flu H1N1 strain that was found at Fort Dix, New Jersey. Because of fears that this swine flu strain was similar to the flu strain that caused the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, a vaccination program immunized more than 40 million people in the United States between October 1976 to December 1976.
The immunization program was stopped early because the swine flu pandemic didn't occur, and the swine flu vaccine was thought to cause many side effects, including Guillain-Barre syndrome.
It is important to note that the 2009 H1N1 swine flu vaccine that is going to be used in the United States is basically a flu vaccine and the FDA states that it was 'manufactured using the same approved processes used to produce the seasonal influenza vaccines.' It does not contain any new adjuvants, which are vaccine additives that can help them to work better. It was the possibility that the 2009 H1N1 swine flu vaccine was going to contain some new adjuvants which made people originally think this was a 'new' vaccine and created some of the controversy about it.
