BANGOR (AP) – State health officials have expanded the eligibility guidelines for who should get flu vaccines after determining that vaccines are going unclaimed.

Dr. Lani Graham of the Bureau of Health said Friday that vaccines will now be made available to people ages 50 and older, instead of just those who are 65 and older.

The announcement followed a decision by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to expand its guidelines in making the vaccine available to more people.

Health officials had been faced with a nationwide shortage of vaccines earlier this fall, but now say there are enough doses available to expand the at-risk guidelines.

“We’d like to thank the healthy Mainers who have held back from being vaccinated this season,” Graham said. “It has meant that all those at highest risk for severe illness, or even potentially death, were able to get access to the vaccine first and that we have enough vaccine to expand our recommended groups again.”

The state in October asked health care providers to limit their supplies of flu vaccine to people with the greatest risk of flu-related health complications.

The announcement came after British regulators unexpectedly shut down a major flu-shot supplier, citing problems at a factory in England that manufactured roughly 46 million doses destined for the United States.

Public clinics in October and November were swamped with high-risk residents, including the very young, the very old and the chronically ill. But as the number of available doses dwindled, people stopped trying.

In the past two months, the Maine Bureau of Health has worked with the CDC to collect more than 160,000 doses of flu vaccine, which have been distributed to physicians, nursing homes, home health agencies and other health care providers across the state. As of Wednesday, there had been 13 confirmed influenza A cases in Maine.

To serve the expanded group of those eligible for flu vaccines, the state has scheduled a series of flu vaccine clinics across the state beginning this week.