This Year, Flu Season Has Fear Factor

The outbreak is sweeping California, the contagion moving faster than the Santa Ana winds in a lonely canyon pass.

A flu epidemic? Not yet. Instead, health officials say, it is an epidemic of flu panic.

Frantic parents are filling pediatricians’ offices in search of the now hard-to-find flu vaccine. The worried well are lining up -- better late than never -- for protection.

Driving their fear, largely, are reports of virulent outbreaks and deaths in other states. Not that people aren’t catching the flu in California. The season appears to be peaking early in some places -- especially Fresno and Sacramento counties. The flu or its complications have been blamed for the deaths of an elderly San Luis Obispo resident and a 7-year-old Bakersfield boy, and possibly caused the deaths of a 5-year-old Arizona boy visiting Compton and a 13-year-old San Diego County girl.

But in some populous parts of this state, demand for the flu vaccine far outstrips the number of illnesses. Los Angeles County, for instance, is having an average season so far.

“Here in L.A., our experience is pretty much par for this season every year,” said Dr. David Dassey, deputy chief of the county’s acute communicable disease unit. “By and large, this is the time when we begin to see an increase in complaints.... For us it’s normal, and arriving on time.”

Yet county health officials say their phones are ringing constantly as desperate patients and parents search for doctors with a cache of the fast-dwindling vaccine.

The manufacturers are running out. Anyone in a high-risk category -- children under age 5, senior citizens and people with chronic conditions such as asthma or diabetes -- can still get vaccinated at county clinics, health officials say. Other people are left to seek the services of private doctors. Health officials advised against seeking vaccinations at emergency rooms.

With word of outbreaks in Colorado, Nevada and other states, everyone seems to want shots now, said Maria Iacobo, a Los Angeles County Department of Health Services spokeswoman.

Even while she is speaking, a worried mother calls, wondering where she can get her children vaccinated. Her own pediatrician, she tells Iacobo, has run out. Keep hunting, Iacobo tells her.

“If you went to the grocery store and you went to buy milk and they didn’t have any milk, would you think there was no milk left in Los Angeles County? No, it’s that that one store didn’t have any milk and you’ll have to work a little harder to find it,” she said.

Victoria Tapia, 29, spent two weeks looking for a flu shot for her 5-year-old son, Francisco Reynoso, traveling by bus from her home in South Los Angeles as far as Huntington Park.

“I heard in the news that a child died,” she explained. “I’m afraid something will happen to him.” She finally found a clinic in South Central Los Angeles, the Central Neighborhood Medical Group, that had vaccine, and Francisco was vaccinated Friday.

Iacobo and others said that while the flu vaccine is in short supply, a nasal inhalant called FluMist is readily available at pharmacies without a prescription. The mist, as protective as the vaccine, is appropriate for healthy patients ages 5 to 49.

In recent years, the county health services department has ended flu seasons with a vaccine surplus that it discarded. So far this year, the county has blazed through its initial allotment of 138,000 doses, and is distributing a second batch.

Throughout the region, fear is pervasive. Last season, parents would wait a few days if their child had a cough or other symptoms before bringing him or her to the doctor, said Carol Schoger, manager of primary care at Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

“Now you ask how long the child has been sick, and they [say], ‘Since yesterday,’ ” Schoger said. “I think they’re pretty scared by what’s out there.”

Gilbert Avila, 22, of Santa Ana said he waited an hour for a shot this week at the UC Irvine Family Health Center in Santa Ana, but the clinic ran out of vaccine before it was his turn. He went home.

“With all the sick kids waiting around, I got a little paranoid,” he said.

Avila said he feels “a little ridiculous and dumb” that he didn’t get a flu vaccine in October or November when it was easy to come by. “Then all of a sudden there’s this media coverage of all these people dying,” Avila said, and he got scared.

Many health-care providers say they are rationing their vaccine supplies or that they are fresh out.

“I’ve never seen it like this,” said Charles Bonner, owner of Steven’s Pharmacy in Costa Mesa. “The media has gotten everybody scared and everybody is rushing out to get shots.”

Dr. Hsiao-Fen Chen in San Gabriel said she ran out of flu vaccine at the end of November, after dispensing 2,000 shots. People are still calling, asking for the vaccine, she said, and she sees about 30 flu patients each day.

In Tarzana, Dr. Kenneth R. Keer also has run out of flu vaccine and has a waiting list of 50 to 60 families. “People are getting panicky,” Keer said.

In an average year, about 114,000 people nationwide are hospitalized with flu-related illnesses and 36,000 die. Whether this year’s flu season turns out to be worse than last year’s remains to be seen, state officials say.

What is clear is that this flu season began unusually early in some places. If cases remain high through February, the nation could have record-breaking numbers of sick people.

“We won’t know until it peaks and we see the figures on hospitalizations,” said Dr. Howard Backer, acting chief of the state health department’s immunization branch.

Some parts of California have been hit harder than others.

“We’ve seen over 1,000 kids since Nov. 1,” said Micheline Golden, a spokeswoman for Children’s Hospital of the Central Valley in Fresno. “We have doctors who’ve been in our emergency room 25 years who say they’ve never seen this many kids.”

For most people, catching the flu will not lead to dire consequences. It causes symptoms including nausea, headache, fever and congestion.

“You’ll get sick and you’ll be out for a week,” said Iacobo of L.A. County.

While the season’s most prevalent type of flu, influenza Type A, has historically been associated with more severe seasons and a higher number of hospitalizations and deaths, it is not inherently worse than other types, Dassey said.

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Comparing infections

Flu and cold symptoms seem alike, but influenza is a serious viral illness that can develop into life-threatening complications, such as pneumonia. The flu, spread by air or by touching an infected surface, attacks the respiratory tract.

*--* Symptom Cold Flu Fever Rare 102 degrees, can reach 104 degrees; lasts 3-4 days Headache Rare Sudden onset; can be severe Muscle ache Mild Usual; often severe Tired/weak Mild Often extreme; can last two weeks or more Exhaustion Never Sudden onset; can be severe Runny nose Often Sometimes Sneezing Often Sometimes Sore throat Often Sometimes Cough Mild, hacking Usual; can become severe

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Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention