Recap: Flu Shot Shortage?

On Wednesday evening's newscast, NewsChannel 15 ran a story that the Allen County-Fort Wayne Department of Health was still urging only high-risk individuals to get a flu shot, despite the fact that others had pointed out that health officials everywhere else were urging everyone to get one.

What WANE neglected to mention was that the person who pointed out the discrepancy was Mitch Harper, a -- gasp -- blogger!  This Indiana Parley post prompted their story, which was quite newsworthy considering many people could needlessly get the flu if the Health Department was mistakenly telling them not to get a flu shot unless they qualified as "at-risk."

A few days later, it looks like the Health Department's concern was legitimate, as a Google news search reveals some patches of flu shot shortages due to one company (Chiron) failing to fill all its orders, though many of the stories that come up are about communities that don't have a shortage, which is good news for those areas.

And, as Harper noted, many local health care providers have plenty of flu shots available:

Earlier today, I was at the office of a health care provider. I overheard the receptionist take a telephone call from a patient. Although I only heard one side of the call it was clear that the patient was asking whether vaccine was being restricted. The receptionist urged the patient to come to the office; that there were plenty of doses. This was confirmed when I talked to one of the medical professionals in the office.

It appears you have two choices: call your doctor, or wait and let those most at-risk get their flu shot first, hoping that Chiron gets its act together before the flu season hits.

If they don't, I suggest spending the winter someplace warm, where you don't have to worry about getting the flu...