H1N1 jab plan to be expanded citywide

The A/H1N1 influenza inoculation plan may be expanded to include people without a Beijing residency permit, the government said yesterday.

"We are working on a plan for those people who do not have a Beijing hukou and have not yet received the inoculation, but no details are available now," Zhao Tao, associate councilor of Beijing municipal health bureau, said at a press conference yesterday.

The government is also considering vaccinating foreigners, but Zhao said no details were available yesterday.

Beijing launched the second wave of its inoculation plan yesterday, which covers holders of hukou or residency permits.

Participants in the National Day parade, students, and employees at government agencies, large organizations and companies were included in the first wave.

More than 80,000 students from migrant families were given vaccinations earlier this month. Foreign students in qualified schools and foreigners whose employers were included in the program for the shots were also eligible.

But other members of the migrant population and foreigners were not included.

The bureau said that by Sunday, more than 1.4 million Beijing residents had received the vaccination.

Pang Xinghuo, deputy director of Beijing center for disease prevention and control, said side effects had been reported among the 1.4 million, but the rate was no higher than for ordinary flu vaccines.

At the China-Japan Friendship Hospital, 168 local residents were vaccinated by 11:00 am yesterday.

"One elderly man lined up in front of our vaccination room at 7 am," said Fan Qinying, director of the medical care department at the hospital.

"He said he is going abroad in a few days, and he is eager to take the vaccine before heading to another country."

Fan said the hospital prepared about 4,500 vaccines, which they believe will be enough to cover the first week.

Fan predicted that about half of the 100,000 eligible residents would choose to be vaccinated.

(China Daily 11/17/2009 page26)