LEWISTON – A flu vaccine clinic for adults – the only one to be held in Androscoggin County – has been scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 20.

Eligibility is so limited that some cancer patients won’t qualify for immunization.

About 9,000 doses of vaccine are expected to be available at the two clinic sites. An estimated 9,600 people are likely to seek the preventative medicine, said registered nurse Carolyn Reilly.

Reilly is director of emergency preparedness for central Maine, a district created by the state Bureau of Health. She’s the person who coordinated the clinics. Central Maine Medical Center and St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center are cooperating in distributing the vaccine.

Clinic sites are being kept confidential.

Reilly said that if the locations become widely known, “We’ll have buses of people from Massachusetts coming up here trying to get a shot. This clinic,” she added, “is for people in Androscoggin County; not from Portland, not from Bangor.”

People who qualify – adults over age 65 in fair or poor health and adults under 65 receiving regular medical care or hospitalization during the past year for certain conditions – will be told of the clinic sites in a letter from their personal physician.

Letter required

And only people who bring that doctor’s letter with them to the clinic site will be considered for inoculation, Reilly said.

Even then some people could be turned away if demand exceeds the supply of vaccine. “Each clinic will serve people on a first-come, first-served basis until the vaccine is gone,” states an advisory issued by CMMC and St. Mary’s.

However, “We don’t want people showing up at 4 in the morning,” Reilly said. The clinics will open at 8 a.m. They’re scheduled to run through 2 p.m., but Reilly said the clinics will remain open until all patients are served or vaccine runs out.

Reilly said the clinic sites are large enough to accommodate crowds without leaving people waiting out in the cold on sidewalks and along streets. If lines exceed capacity, she said people will be given numbers and asked to come back later.

Reilly asked patients to be patient with their health care providers in seeking the letters they’ll have to bring with them to clinics to get the shots.

She said many physicians and group practices have hired additional help to handle the flood of telephone calls anticipated in advance of the clinics. Busy signals are likely, however, and callers were being asked to be both considerate and understanding.

Costly effort

“We’re seeing some wonderful examples of cooperation between physicians and practices and the hospitals,” Reilly said. “People should be aware that this effort is extremely costly, and they won’t be recouping those costs with the price of the flu shot.”

Shots will cost $16 each. Administering the inoculations will be an estimated 80 employees of CMMC and St. Mary’s at each clinic site. They’ll be working a Saturday and paid overtime rates, Reilly noted.

She said the hospitals have concluded successful clinics for children at risk; 4,800 letters were mailed to those kids’ parents and 1,300 shots of vaccine were administered.

Vaccine also has been distributed to the county’s long-term-care facilities for inoculating patients there, and obstetrician’s practices have been given adequate doses to treat pregnant patients, Reilly said.

She said some vaccine will be shipped to rural health centers such as the DFD Russell practices in Turner, Leeds and Monmouth, and more will be sent from the state Bureau of Health to doctor’s offices around the county between now and mid-December. How many doses wasn’t clear, however.

The state has estimated that 36,000 people in the county are considered high risk. Reilly said that means “they could die” from complications resulting from the flu.

“We had to make some tough decisions” in terms of which patients would qualify for vaccine and which wouldn’t, she said.

Among those who haven’t been vaccinated are health care providers, except for a small number who were at risk themselves or who would leave a patient base completely with services if they became ill.

The vaccine shortage resulted in October when British health officials impounded millions of doses of vaccine suspected to be contaminated that were destined for distribution in the United States.