Dallas County expands swine flu shot clinics to insured residents at risk

Insured residents of Dallas County who are at high risk for swine flu complications will have their first chance Saturday to get a flu shot from the county health department.

Health officials said Monday that they would expand the county's vaccination effort at two neighborhood flu clinics as well as share its vaccine supply with pharmacies.

More than 10,000 H1N1 vaccine doses have been distributed to unemployed county residents who had nowhere else to get it. The health department received an additional 19,000 doses last week and began exploring how to share the supply with pharmacies.

An announcement on that arrangement is expected today.

"We're trying to expand the number of people who can receive the vaccine so that the insured priority groups can get vaccinated," said Zachary Thompson, director of the health department.

He encouraged both insured and uninsured county residents in the high-risk categories to call the county's flu hotline – 214-819-6001 – to secure a vaccination appointment at a Saturday clinic being planned in south Oak Cliff.

The hotline will take calls from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. today through Friday for the Saturday clinic.

It will be from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at Antioch Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church, 7550 S. Hampton Road in Dallas.

"Don't call the church or come by on Saturday without an appointment," Thompson warned. "We will not be seeing any walk-ins."

A second H1N1 clinic will be Dec. 5 at St. Barnabas Presbyterian Church, 1220 W. Belt Line Road in Richardson. Appointments for that clinic can be made by calling the hotline Dec. 1 to Dec. 4.

Tarrant County also announced Monday that vaccinations will be available for high-risk residents, as long as supplies last, starting Friday at seven public health centers.

The broader vaccination effort in Dallas County is arriving as the local H1N1 flu outbreak appears to be subsiding among schoolchildren and patients seeking care at local emergency rooms, said Dr. John Carlo, the county's medical director.

"School absentee rates for the last few weeks have been normal compared to last year," he noted Monday.

Hospital emergency room visits are at "nearly normal rates" for the flu at this time of year, he said.

Nonetheless, the health department continues to be inundated in recent weeks with calls from people unable to find the H1N1 vaccine at their private doctor's offices or at pharmacies. The vaccine's slow release nationwide has been blamed on manufacturing delays.

Carlo noted that it was impossible to know if the local H1N1 outbreak would subside completely or would return later this winter in a more virulent form.

So far, 21 deaths in Dallas County have been associated with the outbreak.

Carlo said he welcomed the lull as the vaccine was being offered more broadly.

"This is an opportunity to get the vaccine out to the people who are going to benefit most," he said.