Swine Flu vaccinations to be made available this autumn

A free swine flu vaccination is to be offered to the general population in the coming months, as part of a major plan to avoid the worst affects of a global pandemic.The HSE plans to acquire over 7,500,000 doses of the vaccine, at a cost of almost €90m.The jabs would be administered by GPs or through a network of over a hundred swine flu clinics and will be ready by the autumn. Twelve new cases of swine flu were confirmed in Ireland yesterday, bringing the total number in Ireland to 63. A case has yet to be confirmed in Kerry however it seems that its a question of if rather than when with numbers on the increase everyday. In a worrying development, officials in Hong Kong said yesterday that they have detected a case of swine flu which is resistant to Tamiflu, the main treatment for the virus.The World Health Organisation has declared a pandemic is underway from the new H1N1 strain of the virus. More information on how to limit the spread of the virus is available at the HSE's website, http://www.hse.ie/