The Ingham County Health Department is expanding its criteria for eligibility to receive the swine flu vaccine.

In order to assure full immunity against 2009 H1N1 influenza, children through age 9 must receive two vaccinations, spaced 3-4 weeks apart. To ensure that these children are able to get their second vaccination sooner, the Ingham County Health Department is now including healthy children ages 5 through 9 as an eligible group to receive H1N1 vaccination. This represents a subset of one of the groups that the CDC recommends for vaccination.

This makes about 15,000 more people eligible for the vaccine. It is important to bear in mind that the supply of vaccine is still less than the number of people eligible to receive it.

The target groups now include the following Ingham County residents only:
· Pregnant women,
· Household members who live with infants under 6 months old,
· Children ages 6 months through 9 years old, and
· Children, adolescents and adults ages 10 through 64 years old who have an underlying medical condition that places them at higher risk for influenza-related complications. These people should provide documentation of their medical condition, such as a doctor's note, prescription, or an empty pill bottle.

The Department has a number of H1N1 community vaccination clinics scheduled. At these clinics anyone in the target groups can be vaccinated. The next two clinics scheduled are:
- Hill Career Academy, Wise Road, Lansing, Thursday 4:00 pm to 7:00 pm.
· Hill Career Academy, Wise Road, Lansing, Saturday, November 7, 9:00 am to 3:00 pm.
· Pattengill Middle School, Lansing, Tuesday, November 10, 4:00 pm to 7:00 pm.

Vaccine is also available through the Department's walk-in clinic. For the complete clinic schedule, and for the walk-in clinic hours, go to hd.ingham.org.

In addition, the Health Department has recently distributed over 12,000 doses of H1N1 vaccine to area physicians and hospitals. Individuals should contact their physician to see if they are offering the H1N1 vaccine. Health care providers are urged to limit the H1N1 vaccine to those in the priority groups until additional H1N1 vaccine becomes available.

Source: Ingham County Health Department.