# 3956
In stark contrast to statements made just 4 days ago by a prominent White House Advisor, Thomas Frieden – Director of the CDC – indicated before a House Subcommittee session today that the shortage of vaccine was likely to last a while.
Last Sunday we were treated to this astonishingly optimistic assessment:
H1N1 vaccine struggling to catch up to demand
10 million more doses expected to be available this week, official says
updated 1:40 p.m. ET, Sun., Nov . 1, 2009
WASHINGTON - A senior adviser to President Barack Obama says the government will catch up to the demand for swine flu vaccine within a week.
Obama adviser David Axelrod says the manufacturers of the vaccine were wrong when they advised the administration earlier this year that they would have 40 million doses ready near the end of October. Instead, only 28 million doses of vaccine were available.
Axelrod says 10 million more doses are expected to be available this week. He predicted that the U.S. will have all the vaccine it needs "in very short order."
Today, we got what appears to be a far more realistic assessment from the Director of the CDC. Robert Roos, News Editor of CIDRAP, brings us the details in his reporting tonight.
CDC says vaccine shortage likely to outlast current H1N1 wave
Robert Roos
News Editor
Nov 4, 2009 (CIDRAP News) – The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) predicted today that the current wave of H1N1 influenza is likely to begin to wane before the shortage of vaccine for it eases.
Dr. Thomas Frieden made the comment at a wide-ranging US House subcommittee session that aired the reasons for and impact of the vaccine delays and the prospects for avoiding a repeat of the problem. The session was streamed over the Web.
"It's likely that the current wave of infection will peak, crest, and begin to decline before there are ample supplies," Frieden told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. "Whether there'll be another wave of H1N1 between now and May and whether we'll get a different strain, only time will tell."
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