Demand for swine flu vaccines shoots up in Pune

With swine flu deaths being reported again in the city, the demand for vaccines has shot up. Doctors and chemists confirmed the rise in demand, stating that most requests came from parents who are rushing to get their children vaccinated.

Currently, four injectable trivalent vaccines for influenza viruses including H1N1 are available in the market for swine flu. The fifth vaccine, which chemists say was highly popular at the time of the pandemic i.e. Serum Institute of India’s Nasovac, is now out of stock.

Pediatrician Dr Sharad Agharkhedkar said the demand for vaccines has gone up from nil a few days ago to an average of 10 requests a day.

Pediatrician Dr Shishir Modak said, “It costs around Rs600-700 per dose. The vaccines currently available are injectable and offer protection against viruses of the influenza family besides H1N1. It’s advisable to get this shot repeated every year as different strains of the virus keep coming.”

He advised people who had got vaccinated two years ago to repeat it. “While it’s true that until the virus changes its form, the antibodies can fight the infection. But after a year, our body’s immunity goes down. Hence as a booster, the vaccine should be taken again,” he said.

Sandesh Karnawat, medicine distributor who owns Sunil Medicals, said the vaccines currently are available Influvac, Agrippal, Vaxigrip, Fluarix and Vaxiflu-S, all priced Rs600 onwards. However, they are cheaper for doctors.

Rajan Doshi, proprietor of Rajan Sales Corporation, said that while sales had indeed gone up, many enquiries were coming in for economical Nasovac.

He recalled how in February, thousands of doses of Nasovac were wasted as there were no sales and the expiry period was crossed.

“The other vaccines are also expiring between May- June, 2012, we don’t know how much sales would happen before that,” said Karnawat.