There is certainly lots of media, rumors and misunderstanding about a recent publication from Australia speaking to the effectiveness of this year's flu vaccine. Various sources report 10% effectiveness for a portion of the flu vaccine specific to influenza A H3N2 and the Southern Hemisphere. For a number of reasons, the Australian situation is not necessarily predictive of what we should expect in the U.S. or in Spokane County.

National Influenza Vaccination Week 2018

Dec. 2 – 8, 2018

Influenza is a potentially serious disease that can lead to hospitalization and sometimes even death. An annual seasonal flu vaccine is the best way to help protect against flu.

Recognizing the need to bring health messaging to the community in various languages, SRHD Immunization Assessment & Promotion program developed culturally competent, ethnically diverse fliers and posters in multiple languages that promote routine childhood immunizations. 

Multiple continuing education opportunities are coming soon!  April 25 - National Foundation for Infectious Diseases (NFID) offers a free webinar on Strategies for Overcoming Barriers to Healthcare Personnel Immunization. May 22 - VaxExpo at CenterPlace Event Center in Spokane Valley. Coming Soon - Free e-learning course on Communicating with Parents about Vaccines. 

It’s been a long year. Yes, a year. On January 21, Washington State reached the one-year mark since the first case of COVID-19 was reported. Since then, we’ve faced closures of schools, playgrounds and have gone mostly virtual.

The last year has brought disease prevention to the forefront of our minds. Right now, vaccines are a major focus of disease prevention. Black history month is a perfect month to look at disease prevention through major contributions to the vaccine movement by two important people.

In late December, nearly a year after the pandemic began, it was announced with great excitement that vaccinations against COVID-19 would begin in Washington state.

By now, you’ve probably heard the news that the third COVID-19 vaccine, Johnson & Johnson, was authorized for distribution but was temporarily paused before being authorized once again for use in the United States. Even though another vaccine in our toolbelt is great news and gives us another tool to manage the spread of COVID-19, there are a lot of questions about the vaccine that we’re excited to answer.

Parenting is full of tough choices that are neither right nor wrong, but somewhere in the middle. The choice you make comes down to your family’s situation and the amount of risk and benefit there is. Have you noticed during the pandemic these choices have been harder, and critics on both sides have been louder?

COVID-19 disrupted both in-person learning and routine well-child visits for many children during the last year. We all want our kids to be back in school safely, and that means getting caught up on vaccines that were missed during the past year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) public sector vaccine ordering data show a 14% drop in childhood vaccines for the period of the 2020-2021 school year compared to the 2018-2019 school year, and measles vaccine is down by more than 20%. Catch-up vaccination will require efforts from healthcare systems, healthcare providers, schools, state and local governments, and families.

Many individuals in Spokane County are still unsure of how to get vaccinated—this includes both adults and adolescents age 12 and older If your practice is not currently offering COVID-19 vaccine, please share the sites below with individuals inquiring about vaccination.

Across Washington state and the country, there have been outbreaks of COVID-19 in many settings. Some of the most difficult outbreaks to control and manage are those in congregate settings. Washington state and Spokane County have had their share of these outbreaks to manage. In Spokane County, the Spokane Regional Health District (SRHD) epidemiology team has managed outbreaks in homeless shelters, family shelters, drug treatment centers, behavioral health facilities, county correctional facilities, supported living facilities and group homes.

The timeline for the COVID-19 vaccine can be unclear to many, but if you want to look at the big picture, research began all the way back to the 1930s with the discovery of the first coronavirus infection in chickens. Decades later in 1965 Dr. June Almeida was able to identify a coronavirus under a microscope.

Parents across the country are breathing a sigh of relief that a COVID-19 vaccine is now approved for emergency use in kids aged 5-11. We understand how exciting it is. It’s true that, overall, children have seen less severe cases of COVID-19 than adults, but that doesn’t mean they are not at risk. The question for any medical intervention should never be whether it is perfect, but rather does the benefit of the treatment outweigh the risks. In this case, multiple agencies with the most qualified professionals across the United States have almost unanimously agreed that yes, COVID-19 poses much more of a risk to our children than vaccination.

November is Native American heritage month, and we are excited to share one of many ways the communities with this rich heritage have been leaders in public health.