Government-funded influenza vaccinations would be changed from trivalent to quadrivalent vaccines starting next flu season, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said yesterday.
Specialists from the ministry and its affiliated Centers for Disease Control (CDC) held meetings and suggested purchasing quadrivalent flu vaccines for the government-funded vaccination program this year, which was approved by the Cabinet, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) said.
“We have decided to administer quadrivalent vaccines,” he said, adding that the Food and Drug Administration is working on their procurement.
Photo: Wu Liang-yi, Taipei Times
The government has been funding a trivalent vaccine that protects against the influenza A (H1N1) strain, the influenza A (H3N2) strain and a Victoria lineage influenza B strain, Chen said.
However, CDC disease monitoring data from the past 10 years showed that two strains of the influenza type B were often circulating at the same time, he said.
Quadrivalent vaccines protect against two strains of the influenza type A strains and two strains of the influenza type B.
The WHO also recommends quadrivalent vaccines as the first choice, and they have been adopted by many European countries as well as the US, Japan, Australia and others, Chen said.
A cost-benefit analysis of flu vaccines also suggests that purchasing quadrivalent vaccines would be a better choice, he added.
The new vaccines are expected to cost about NT$1.5 billion (US$48.63 million), which is about NT$790 million higher than last year and would be paid from the CDC’s vaccination fund, CDC Director-General Chou Jih-haw (周志浩) said.
The goal this year is to administer about 6 million doses of government-funded vaccines, including 300,000 doses for children under three, Chou said.
However, as a WHO advisory body has been late in recommending an H3N2 strain for influenza vaccines this year, vaccine manufacturers have just begun producing the vaccines, so there is a chance that government-funded flu vaccinations might begin sometime after Oct. 1, Chen said.
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