Previous Story
DPH: 85 pct. of community members now vaccinated
|
Posted on Jul 19 2011
About 85 percent of island residents have already been vaccinated against the flu since the campaign started in January this year, according to a senior health official yesterday.
Warren F. Villagomez, the Department of Public Health’s hospital preparedness office director, said the estimate uses a base rate of about 30,000 people from the last census for the Commonwealth.
He described the result as a big success for the campaign against flu. Majority of those vaccinated are school-aged children and those in the vulnerable population—those with chronic disease, the elderly, and pregnant women.
Villagomez said the department has enough doses of flu vaccines to cover the non-vaccinated population until the end of the year.
The CNMI received in March this year 1,500 doses donated by the Hawaii Pacific Command Tripler Army Medical Center. The donation was intended to augment the potential shortfall of the available flu vaccines on island.
Saipan Tribune learned that DPH last received its shipment of flu vaccines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in November last year. The department has had a total of 18,000 doses since November.
Early this year, DPH saw a drastic increase in the number of patients with flu-like symptoms, reaching about 300 cases each month. Villagomez said the number significantly went down to about less than a hundred per month, with zero admissions to the hospital’s emergency room.
Villagomez attributed the remarkable decline to the department’s effective campaign, which used all forms of media to ensure that community members were informed about how to avoid the flu. This summer, the agency participated in youth camps to provide health and prevention knowledge to children.
