By Phil Serafino
Sept. 24 (Bloomberg) — Manufacturers can produce about 3 billion doses of swine flu vaccine annually, less than the 5 billion initially estimated, the World Health Organization said.
There won’t be enough shots to protect all 6.8 billion people around the globe, the Geneva-based United Nations agency said in an e-mailed statement today. The WHO said last week that production would miss its May forecast because of difficulties growing the virus known as H1N1.
“Global manufacturing capacity for influenza vaccines is limited, inadequate and not readily augmented,” according to the WHO statement. “Both regulatory authorities and vaccine manufacturers have made extraordinary efforts to expedite the availability of vaccines.” Read More…
