Government told to vaccinate millions more against flu

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Government told to vaccinate millions more against flu

? Lansley accused of U-turn as campaign is restarted
? Tory MP warns health secretary over NHS reforms

Health secretary Andrew Lansley was tonight under pressure to get a grip on the winter flu outbreak, amid warnings that millions more people need to be vaccinated in order to prevent a mounting toll of deaths.

Lansley was accused of a U-turn as he reinstated a public health advertising campaign after he was warned by government advisers of the need to improve immunisation rates which are at their lowest this winter for many years.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), the government's advisers on vaccines to prevent serious illness, said 16 million Britons are at serious risk from flu. The committee said a greater uptake of the flu jab was vital among groups including pregnant women, those with breathing conditions such as asthma, and people with diabetes or heart, liver or kidney disease.

Lansley reinstated the national Catch It, Bin It, Kill It advertising campaign. It had been discontinued despite helping educate the public to adopt good hygiene habits during last year's H1N1 swine flu epidemic at a cost of just �609,000.

He has been criticised for not instigating the campaign to urge everyone at risk to get a seasonal flu jab from their GP, for ending the Catch It publicity drive, and for not ensuring that all under-fives were offered the vaccine.

But the JCVI ruled out the need for under-fives to be added to the list of those advised to get routinely vaccinated, and said there was not enough evidence to justify recommending that switch.

There were 12 more deaths in the last week from flu, bringing the total this winter to 39, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) said today. Thirty-six of them were killed by H1N1 swine flu, which is the most virulent of the two main flu strains currently circulating. The other three died after contracting Influenza B, the other strain. All except one of the 39 were under 65 and four were under five, which underlined how the dominance of this winter's flu by H1N1 means it is mainly affecting groups other than the elderly.

Significantly, 23 of 38 of the fatalities belonged to one of the clinical "at risk" groups whose health is at potentially serious risk if they get infected. And only two out of 33 had received a winter flu jab recently, despite their vulnerable health status, the HPA confirmed.

With experts predicting the next few days will bring the peak of this winter's flu season there were signs that the NHS is under growing pressure. The number of people receiving critical care in hospital, mainly because their breathing has been badly affected by flu, leapt from 460 to 738 in the last week ? a rise of over 50%. Arrowe Park hospital, in Merseyside, has stopped allowing visitors to come and see patients in a bid to ensure that patients are kept as clear of flu as possible.

The expert committee held a teleconference yesterday after the Department of Health (DH) asked them to review whether the existing vaccination policy, which has been subjected to serious criticism in recent days, needed to change. They said: "It would be hoped that influenza circulation will have subsided within a month. The greatest gain will be achieved in increasing vaccine uptake in the clinical risk groups." These groups total some 14.5 million people in England alone, and about 16m in the UK.

Lansley's Labour counterpart, John Healey, said: "I welcome Andrew Lansley's U-turn on the use of a public advertising campaign to help tackle the flu crisis. The health secretary made a serious misjudgment when he axed the annual autumn advertising campaign to help public understanding of this flu and boost vaccinations for those most at risk. At a time when the NHS is stretched and playing catch up, the decision he has taken today is better late than never."

"With Britain about to go back to school and work after the Christmas and New Year break, I welcome Andrew Lansley's change of mind on public advertising to back up the efforts of doctors, nurses and midwives to boost flu-jab protection for the groups most at risk and to advise people on how to deal with those in the family who have flu."

Lansley is about to overhaul both the NHS and public health budgets which will see GPs commission �80bn of healthcare.

Denis Campbell

Allegra Stratton

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