Issue date: 11/12/09 Section: Opinion

Sacramento State has been forced to retract a promise it made about H1N1 vaccinations last month.

As of the second week of November, our campus is still without a serum for the pandemic swine flu.

But our university is not at fault for this mishap. One institution cannot be blamed for this problem.

The California Department of Public Health was scheduled to get the vaccine to hospitals and local clinics - such as the Student Health Center - by sometime in October; nothing came in.

Diane Sipkin, medical chief of staff of the Student Health Center, said she has been trying to contact the state health department to find out when the vaccine is being delivered, but has yet to receive a definitive answer.

"I called them probably once or twice a week, for the past several weeks," she said. "They keep telling me it'll be arriving in the next week or two."

If the state's shipment does not arrive within the next two weeks, Sacramento County's Public Health Division will be loaning Sac State part of its more than 36,000 doses of vaccine, Sipkin said.

She was not sure how many doses would be coming in, and the county has no set date for when the vaccine will be given to Sac State.

"We are very much hoping that it will come in before Thanksgiving," she said.

Until the delivery comes in, the county is offering free vaccinations from Nov. 16 to Jan. 15, and people are being urged to turn to their regular health care providers for the vaccine.

Sipkin said shots will be reserved for high-risk groups such as children, pregnant women and health care workers.

After Nov. 24, the general public will also have access to the vaccines.

So, what is holding up the deliveries?

Kerry Shearer, spokesman for the county public health division, said the deliveries have been slow because vaccine producers are splitting their workload.

"They're really producing two vaccines and distributing them both at once," he said.

One form of the vaccine is an injection and the other is a nasal spray.

Whereas the injection has dead cells, the nasal spray contains weakened H1N1 cells, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website.

But how long should it take to make these vaccines in the first place?

Tom Skinner, spokesman for the CDC, said production of the vaccine is taking longer than expected.

"To get all the vaccine we need, it takes about 6 months," he said. "We started in late April, early May."

In total, the CDC is responsible for delivering more than 38 million doses across the country. These vaccines are produced by four companies, Skinner said.

To get vaccines, the health center has to go through the state health department.

The department contacts the CDC, which gets in touch with the four companies producing the vaccine.

After it is produced, the vaccine is sent to the CDC. The CDC delivers it to the state health department, which distributes the shots to hospitals and clinics.

Looking it over, The State Hornet noticed how convoluted this process is, and sees an unnecessary middleman.

The state health department seems to act as an intermediary between vaccine providers and the CDC.

But what happens when providers have questions that only the CDC knows the answers to?

There needs to be some kind of communication between the state and federal departments so providers can get answers.

As of now, the health center seems to be disconnected from the production process.

So, to restate the question, where is our vaccine?

Nobody knows, exactly. But it is coming sometime soon.

Or so somebody says.

opinion@statehornet.com

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