More than 4 million people get flu jabs

INCENTIVIZED: CDC Director-General Philip Lo credited the health ministry’s ‘health coin’ program as encouraging significantly more people to get vaccinated this year

• By Lee I-chia / Staff reporter

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More than 4 million people have received a flu shot since the first phase of the government-funded vaccination program began on Oct. 1, the highest number for the same period in six years, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the influenza epidemic period might end next month.

Although medical visits for flu-like illness fell 18.8 percent to 101,746 visits last week from a week earlier, the decline could be due to healthcare facilities suspending operations on Friday because of Typhoon Champi, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said.

The flu is still in the epidemic period, as 11 percent of the emergency-department visits were for flu-like illness, while 85 severe flu cases and 28 flu-related fatalities were reported last week, she said.

Centers for Disease Control Director-General Philip Lo, left, speaks at a news conference in Taipei yesterday.

Photo: Lin Chih-yi, Taipei Times

Of the 391 severe flu cases recorded, including 57 deaths, since the start of the flu season on Oct. 1, 69.1 percent were people aged 65 or older, while 85.2 percent had chronic illnesses and 99.7 percent had not received a flu shot this season, Lee said.

One of the fatalities reported last week was a woman in her 40s, among the youngest flu deaths this season, CDC physician Lin Leng (林稜) said.

She had chronic conditions of the nervous symptoms and was bedridden, and did not get vaccinated, Lin said.

The woman died of respiratory failure about a week after being hospitalized, she said, adding that contact tracing showed that several of her family members who lived with her had also experienced respiratory symptoms.

The woman’s chronic condition is considered a high-risk factor, making her eligible for the vaccine, Lin said, urging people eligible for the vaccine to get one as soon as possible.

As this season’s vaccination program was coupled with the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s “health coin” scheme, people’s willingness to get vaccinated rose significantly, CDC Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said.

Starting from Oct. 1, people aged 18 or older with National Health Insurance coverage can receive 450, 900 or 600 health coins for receiving the flu, COVID-19 and pneumococcal vaccines respectively, whether the vaccinations are government-funded or paid for out of pocket, he said.

As of Monday, more than 1.83 million people aged 65 or older had received the flu vaccine this season, about 9 percent more than the 1.68 million recorded in the same period last year, bringing their vaccination coverage rate to 38.4 percent, he said.

The number of older adults who received a COVID-19 vaccine also increased by 32 percent to about 940,000 people this season, from about 710,000 people in the same period last year, Lo said.

More than 4 million people received a government-funded flu vaccine between Oct. 1 and Monday, the most for the same period since the program began offering vaccines in two phases in 2021, he said.

About 104,000 people had received a government-funded pneumococcal vaccine and about 3,000 people had paid for one out of pocket, about 3.5 times and 2.4 times the respective totals recorded in the 26 days before Oct. 1, Lo said.

The CDC had originally set a goal of achieving 40 percent pneumococcal vaccine coverage among people aged 65 or older before the end of this year, but Lo said the coverage rate had already risen from 37 percent to 39.9 percent as of Monday.

The second phase of the government-funded flu and COVID-19 vaccination program is to begin on Monday next week, expanding the eligibility to people aged 50 to 64 without high-risk chronic illnesses, the centers said.