Swine flu down drain
July 14, 2010
FROM this month, stockpiles of
Australia’s unused swine flu vaccine
will begin to expire, according to
Jim Bishop, Chief Medical Officer at
the Department of Health and
Ageing.
Addressing the Senate
Community Affairs Legislation
Committee, Bishop divulged the
expiry information following
intensive questioning, saying that
there are still 11 million doses of
unused H1N1 vaccine out of the
government’s 21 million dosage
order (at a cost of around $130
million), which are due to expire in
stages between now and September,
Bishop defended the govt’s
ordering procedures by saying that
when the initial pandemic alert came
out its expert advisors said that
Australia would need two doses per
citizen in order to be covered.
“So it was a prudent course, at
that time, based on expert advice,
to get sufficient doses,” Bishop said.
Bishop said that due to concerns
about the pandemic, decisions had
to be made quickly and the order
was completed by September,
before the vaccine’s “unusual”
clinical trial report was released.
This report found because the
vaccine caused an unusually high
degree of immunity only one dose
per adult would be sufficient.
“You can think, in retrospect:
what else could have been done? In
the face of the first pandemic for
40 years, without knowing the
clinical situation we know now, I
think it was the right decision at the
time to protect the population,”
Bishop said.
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