HHS, Others Sponsor Influenza Vaccination Week

To help boost the number of Americans seeking seasonal influenza immunization and to raise awareness of the need to continue vaccinating throughout November and beyond, HHS, including the CDC, and the National Influenza Vaccine Summit are sponsoring National Influenza Vaccination Week, to be held Nov. 27-Dec. 3.

As a partner in the National Influenza Vaccine Summit, which is co-sponsored by the CDC and AMA, the Academy has thrown its support behind this nationwide influenza immunization initiative.

At a Nov. 13 press conference announcing the week, CDC Director Julie Gerberding, M.D., appeared sensitive to concerns some AAFP members have expressed in the past few weeks that they have yet to receive their full orders of influenza vaccine despite the record amount of influenza vaccine -- as many as 115 million doses -- expected to be produced for use in the United States this season.

"We're only at the beginning of November, and we've already distributed as much vaccine (77 million doses) as we've ever made (for a single season)," Gerberding said. "Yet we know there are still mismatches between the need and the supply in various areas of the country. We're trying to encourage distributors to address those needs as quickly as possible."

Given those distribution difficulties, Gerberding said, her advice to patients would be, "Check now with your provider to determine where and when vaccine is expected to be available in your community."

Gerberding also had some impromptu advice for health care professionals, calling on them to change the way they think about influenza immunization. "As we have more supply and we have a lot more people who need immunization, we have to realize that influenza immunization doesn't just end at Thanksgiving."

That's a familiar refrain to AAFP President Rick Kellerman, M.D., of Wichita, Kan. "In a family physician's office, every day is influenza vaccination day," said Kellerman. "Physicians should encourage influenza vaccination as vigorously in December and January -- if not more so -- as they do in October. Every year, influenza vaccine goes unused at the end of the vaccination season, yet millions of people remain unvaccinated."

Kellerman suggested that family physicians take advantage of the visibility the national week offers and use that impetus to recharge their own influenza immunization awareness and promotional efforts. The take-away message for clinicians, he said, should be to promote influenza immunization as an "all-influenza-season" activity.

"Research tells us our patients want this service and they want it to be delivered in their medical home -- that is, in their family physician's office," Kellerman noted, adding that the CDC has echoed this view of the key role the medical home plays in an online Q&A document about seasonal influenza vaccine that reads, "Optimally, all vaccination should take place within the patient’s medical home, that is, where a patient receives their comprehensive health care."

"Especially for children and those with chronic conditions, it's preferable to get the vaccine from their regular health care provider," Gerberding said during the press conference. "Right now, there are people and places that don't have what they need -- there's no question about that," she said. "But we predict that by National Influenza Vaccination Week we won't be talking about that; we're going to be talking about what we can do to get more people vaccinated."

Fortunately, the 2006-07 influenza season is just beginning to ramp up, Gerberding noted. According to the CDC's Flu Activity Web page, at press time, only one state -- North Carolina -- had reported regional influenza activity. Two states had logged local activity, and about a dozen had reported sporadic activity. "We're just at the very beginning of flu season," said Gerberding. "This means there's time to get vaccinated against influenza, and that's our message today."

The bottom line, according to Kellerman, is that family physicians shouldn't be surprised to see the media buzz surrounding the CDC immunization campaign pushing more patients to seek the vaccine.

"National Influenza Vaccination Week gives us an opportunity to emphasize that from the day vaccine distribution begins, to the next day and the next, and on through the end of January -- family physicians are committed to providing this valuable preventive service for their patients," he said.