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As if this year’s Canadian flu vaccination program hasn’t been convoluted enough, today we get word via Helen Branswell of The Canadian Press, that their National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) has come out encouraging the immediate resumption of seasonal flu shots.
Most of the Provinces abruptly canceled or modified their seasonal vaccination campaigns in late September when news of an as-yet-unpublished Canadian study linking seasonal flu vaccinations with a heightened chance of contracting the pandemic virus became public.
For more details, see:
Branswell On The Canadian Flu Shot Controversy
When Studies Collide
Helen Branswell untangles this latest twist in this ongoing tale.
Panel says no reason to delay seasonal flu shots, can give at same time as H1N1
By: Helen Branswell, Medical Reporter, THE CANADIAN PRESS
1/11/2009 3:50 PM
TORONTO - It is unnecessary to delay giving seasonal flu shots this year because of concerns they might raise the risk of catching swine flu, and provinces and territories should offer the shots as soon as possible, a new recommendation from a panel of Canadian vaccine experts said Sunday.
The National Advisory Committee on Immunization did not criticize the decision by most provinces and territories to put off delivering seasonal shots until the new year - a move based at least in part on unpublished Canadian studies that show a possible link.
But the committee, known as NACI, suggests even if the finding is real the risk of not vaccinating against seasonal flu is greater than the one identified by the studies.
And it is urging provinces and territories to move ahead with seasonal flu shots as soon as is feasible - even giving a thumbs up to the notion of delivering both at the same time, if that can still be arranged.
"We thought that overall, the benefit of getting seasonal flu vaccine was much more significant than this potential harm being seen in only the Canadian studies and it really being a small risk," said NACI chair Dr. Joanne Langley, a pediatric infectious diseases expert at the IWK Health Centre in Halifax.
