A shortage of a new vaccine against shingles has 𒁏led to w🉐aiting lists of New Yorkers desperate to get the shots.
The Shingrix vaccine is at least 90 percent effective ဣin warding off shingles, a painful rash that can erupt decades after childhood chicken pox.
The vaccine is supposed to be given on a two-s♚hot schedule, with the second dose coming between two and six months after the first.
“It’s completely unavailable,” said Phil Zam, the supervising pharmacist at Zitomer on the Upper East Side. “We keep being told that the demand will be met over the next couple of weeks, but
that report started several months ago.”
Z൩am said the pharmacy has a waiting list of about 70 people.
At an Upper West Side pharmacy, some 100 people are on the waiting list and a pharmacist said the shop fields up to 10 calls a day🅠 asking for the vaccine.
“Got the first Shingri♉x vaccine and now I’m about 2 weeks away from the outside recommended time for the 2nd. The problem is there are none to be found. Why market the crap out of the drug if you can’t supply it? Now what? Do I have to get vaccine one again? NOT COOL,” an angry New Yorker tweeted to vaccine maker GlaxoSmithKline this month.
GlaxoSmithKline began selling Shingrix in November 2017 but did not anticipate the huge demand, said Dr. Gordon Ngai, director of research and 🗹educa🌞tion for Mount Sinai Urgent Care.
He called Shingrix a “blockbuster” that wꦐas far better than the existing shingles shot, which was made with a live virus.
“It’s safer,” he said. “It’s more effective.”
About one million people a year come down with shingles with the risk increasing after the age of 50. The ne♌w vaccine is recommended even for those who have had 𓄧the older one.
The CDC is not advising people to start over if they can’t get a second shoꦇt of Shingrix within six months, but rather to try to get it as soon as possible.
GlaxoSmithKline said that beginning this month it was shipping large volumes of the vaccine twice a month rather than ev🐠ery two to three weeks.
“For 2019, we plan to bring significantly more doses to the US compared tꦇo 2018,” a spokesman said.
It said 7 million doses of Shringrix had been given globally by the end of September, mꦫost in the US.