H1N1 widespread in Maine, top health official says

Maine top health officials said today that the H1N1 virus is now widespread in Maine, especially throughout the southern portion of the state.

Dr. Dora Anne Mills said during a news conference that the state is distributing H1N1 vaccine as fast as it can to the areas and institutions that need it most, but is receiving the vaccine more slowly than it had projected.

Still, Mills said 12,000 schoolchildren have received the vaccine this week alone and many more school vaccination clinics are scheduled for next week.

“This is a pediatric pandemic,” she said. “That is why the most important strategy we can deliver right now is to get vaccine into our schools.”

Also today, Gov. John Baldacci renewed a civil emergency order that protects health care workers and school officials from liability associated with providing H1N1 vaccinations.

The governor initially issued his “Civil Emergency Due to a Highly Infectious Agent” on Sept. 1 and renewed it on Sept. 30. The emergency proclamation lasts for 30 days.

Mills praised the work of school nurses, other health professionals and volunteers who have made the widespread vaccinations possible.

“This has been an extraordinary effort,” she said. “We have not seen vaccines given in schools in decades and we have not seen a mass vaccination effort in decades.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been so proud to be a Mainer,” said Mills, head of the Maine Center for Disease Control.

The vaccine is being distributed for use by those who are at high risk of contracting the disease, including children and people who have underlying health conditions that put them at risk of complications from the H1N1 flu strain, including pregnancy.

“All of our children are considered high risk because of their age,” she said.

Vaccinating school children will make entire communities safer because schools are common arena for the spread of infectious disease, she said. Reducing its spread in schools will reduce its spread outside of schools, she said. 

“Not only are we protecting the people disproportionately affected by this pandemic, but we’re also providing protection for the rest of us,” she said.

The state has also provided several thousand doses to pediatricians and obstetricians to make sure it gets to preschool-age children and pregnant women. 

Mills said people at high risk of complications from the illness should avoid large crowds in close quarters.

The state says that by tomorrow it will have received 99,000 doses of vaccine, representing one dose for every seven people in the high risk group, she said. The state had hoped to have 260,000 doses at this point.