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France sell surplus vaccines

France have began to sell off surplus swine flu vaccines as the wide spread virus is kept under control. The Virus is now said to have peaked in both Europe and America but is still causing problems in other parts of the world. France purchased 94 million vaccines last year as fear over the virus spread rapidly around globe. It is believed around 5 million people have received the vaccine in France.

Germany and the Netherlands have also announced plans to sell off their surplus stock of swine flu vaccines.

A French health ministry official told AFP on Sunday: "We started with a plan for two-dose vaccinations but since one dose is sufficient we can start to resell part of the stock."

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Swine flu vaccine recalled

170,000 swine flu vaccines have been recalled after 6 patients vaccinated with the drug had adverse reactions. The batch of 170,000 vaccines was manufactured by UK GlaxoSmithKline and being administered in Canada. It’s not known how many people have been vaccinated with this batch but the amount of people suffering side effects was said to be high.

The reactions caused by the vaccine include breathing difficulty, raised heart rate and skin rashes.

GlaxoSmithKline are now investigating the batch of swine flu vaccines which caused side effects to occur in patients at a rate 5 times higher than the expected. 7.5 million doses of the vaccine have been delivered to Canada buy GlaxoSmithKline the company are choosing not to investigate other bathes insisting only this batch of 170,000 has been affected.

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New strain of swine flu hits UK

A new strain of swine flu that is resistant to anti-viral drugs has been reported in the UK for the first time. The new strain of swine flu which has previously been reported in a number of different countries around the world has been contracted by two people in Scotland.

Anti-viral drugs such as tamiflu have been used to combat the virus since the swine flu pandemic started. Experts have long predicted that such high usage of anti-viral drugs could lead to the virus becoming resistant to them.

The virus has shown no signs of passing from human to human yet and is thought to develop in people that have been on anti viral drugs for a prolonged period.

Mean while the UK continues to roll out its swine flu vaccination programme, vaccinating everyone that has been placed in one of the high risk groups.

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Hello Swine Flu Britain
Excellent and informative website. Well Done. Your readers may also be interested in:
http://www.healthdirect.co.uk/swine_flu_info_symptoms.html

(Posted on 2009-12-01 11:51:00 by Dr Search)

Hospitals feeling the pressure

A senior medical advisor has spoken out claiming hospitals are feeling the strain as the number of people contracting serious swine flu symptoms continues to rise. 137 people have now died from swine flu in the UK and over half a million people have already been infected.

Last week over 70,000 people contracted the swine flu virus, some experts are predicting this number could peak at 1.5 million over the winter months. Hospitals are looking to expand their intensive care wards as more serious cases of swine flu are set to become more common as the flu seasons approaches.

The good news is that swine flu cases are increasing at a slower rate than first feared, this is giving GP’s extra time to get as many high risk patients vaccinated with the new swine flu vaccine as possible.

More info at BBC News

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Why on Earth do people ask these questions on-line,
See your GP ASAP and he will explain and put your mind at rest.
Waiting on the Internet is wasting time and quite often you get silly answers, always ask your Dr or in case of emergency go to Hospital or 999.

(Posted on 2009-11-15 11:19:00 by Rayle)
i have 3 little girls that have it at the moment and there on tammiful but am very worrid as one of my girls has heart murmur and i cant get her temp down can you advise me what to do plz

(Posted on 2009-11-11 12:00:00 by mrs marrable)

NHS staff urged to have swine flu vaccine.

NHS staff are been urged to have the new swine flu vaccine in a bid to control the highly contagious virus. The Nursing times reports that the Department of Health have sent statements to NHS bosses encouraging them to give the new swine flu vaccine a big push.

A few weeks ago a poll highlighted that nearly half of NHS staff would not be prepared to have the new vaccine. As swine flu vaccinations get under way it seems there is worry that many front line health workers will refuse to have the vaccine.

The big push is backed by a promotional campaign with the strap line ‘if you can’t catch it, you can’t spread it’. The campaign hopes to clear up some of the myths surrounding the new vaccine by separating the facts from the rumours. Information from the trials of the swine flu vaccine are not been released.

Official figures showing the amount of front line health workers who have had the swine flu vaccine are expected to released shortly

More information available at the Nursing Times