N.B. swine flu clinics report long lineups
Low-risk 'queue jumpers' said to be causing delays
Last Updated: Friday, October 30, 2009 | 10:38 AM AT
CBC News
New Brunswick public health officials are asking most people to stay away from swine flu vaccination clinics while the province attempts to vaccinate as many high-risk individuals as possible.
Widespread confusion, extremely long waits and cancelled clinics were reported from across New Brunswick on Thursday.
Alissa Lee, a spokeswoman for the province's public health office, said a lot of people who aren't in the designated high-risk groups are trying to jump the queue, which is creating long lineups.
"Moncton, definitely has been one of the places where we've seen long lineups and people waiting up to three hours," Lee said.
The government spokeswoman said they can't turn people way from getting the swine flu vaccine, however, they are asking them to respect the rules.
Lee said most people can wait a week or two, but if people in the priority groups are not vaccinated in time they could die if they catch the swine flu.
The priority groups for the swine flu vaccine are:
- People under 65 with chronic medical conditions.
- Children aged six months to five years.
- Pregnant women.
- School-age children.
- People of aboriginal ancestry.
- Health-care workers.
- Women who have had a baby in the last six weeks.
- People who care for either an infant under six months of age or an immuno-compromised person.
Moncton moves clinic
In Moncton, confusion started when the downtown clinic was shut down and moved to Dieppe.
Lise Roy, an official with Regional Health Authority A, said that with more people showing up they need more room.
"The clinics were initially organized to be designated for specific groups, groups at risk, and then all of a sudden the population started showing up, the general population," Roy said.
"So the office for the [downtown Moncton] location … was not large enough to accommodate all the demand."
But that isn't the only area in the health authority's control that was experiencing a flood of people looking to be vaccinated against swine flu.
Roy said clinics were congested in Bathurst and on the Acadian Peninsula as well.
Children turned away
Swine flu clinics in Saint John had to turn away children on Thursday after public health officials in the city ran out of the vaccine.
Eva Murphy took her daughter Amber, 4, to a clinic designed for children between six months old and five years of age.
She said they were turned away from Centennial Elementary School because the nurses were out of vaccine.
Now her daughter has to wait until Sunday to receive the vaccine, and Murphy said the most vulnerable don't seem to be getting priority.
"It seemed like there was a lot of different age groups there that weren't in the first priority group," Murphy said.
"And maybe they got it before she did, and that's a little frustrating cause you really wonder, well who's getting it and who's not, are the kids who are supposed to get it, are they getting it?"
Government questioned
People who lined up for the first public swine flu vaccination clinic in the Fredericton area say the Health Department had better go back to the drawing board.
As with other clinics around the province, the one at New Maryland Elementary School had hundreds of people waiting for hours.
By the time the doors opened at 4 p.m. on Thursday for the clinic, a queue of more than 700 people stretched from the school's front door, around the building and all the way across the sports field. Many of those were young children or people from other high-risk groups.
Charlie Bartlett, who has a son who suffers from a potentially fatal disease, said a triage system should be in place for H1N1 vaccination clinics.
"They should have been divided, like the natives or the little children under five years of age and the chronically ill," Bartlett said.
"There should be different places for these people to go and there shouldn't be a lineup this big."
It took many people more than six hours of waiting in the cold before they were finally vaccinated late on Thursday evening.
Michelle Dunphy was one those waiting and she said the public heath office should have used a site other than the school.
"At the [New Maryland] rec centre … a bigger venue, it just makes more sense," she said.
"This is a bottleneck right here and all the kids are trying come out, the parents of the kids have nowhere to park. It's a mess."
