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Kinlaw joins CDC’s flu shot ethics team

By Hillary Winn. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has asked four ethicists, including Emory Center for Ethics Director Kathleen Kinlaw, to aid in the development guidelines to determine who should and should not be given the flu vaccine in light of the recent shortage.

The ethicists, who have already discussed the issue over two conference telephone calls, will try to develop an ethical framework for distribution.

Though the CDC will make the ultimate decision, the ethicists will discuss whether or not there are any ethical “lessons that can be applied to this practical question,” said Kinlaw, who is also the director of the Center for Ethics’ program in health sciences ethics.

The United States was slated to receive 100 million doses of the flu vaccine, but potential contamination in the production of some vaccines has cut available dosages in half.

Currently, the CDC recommends that vaccinations be given to several “high risk” groups, including infants, the elderly, pregnant women, those with chronic medical conditions, nursing home residents, children on chronic aspirin therapy, and health care workers.

Individual communities are now struggling to decide, based on who is at the highest risk, who should receive the available vaccinations.

“We will try to be as helpful as we can on local and community levels,” Kinlaw said. “We will discuss how to distribute vaccines where they already exist and how to fairly disseminate doses they do have.”

Kinlaw stressed the importance of not undermining efforts already under way in by communities where vaccines are available.

“I think we need to be aware that local communities have already struggled with the issues and come up with a variety of responses,” Kinlaw said. “We need to look at what responses have already occurred and share that information.”

The ethicists’ task is marked by “urgency,” she said.

“We need to act quickly but not be too hurried,” Kinlaw said.

No deadline has been set for the conclusion of the discussions.

Kinlaw said it would be premature to give her personal opinions regarding who most needs the vaccinations.

“I’m one of a number of folks in bioethics that feel firmly that there is a real role for bioethics…in considerations of public policy,” Kinlaw said. “I hope to bring my ethics background to think through this very relevant area of public policy.”

Although a recent New York Times article called the panel “permanent,” Kinlaw said the ethicists do not yet constitute an official standing committee.

But, she said, the committee has the possibility to become a more permanent body, depending on the situation.

“In there future, there might be something a little more formal,” CDC spokesperson Bonnie Habert said.

Reprinted from the November 2, 2004 edition of The Emory Wheel. Used by permission.

[ Posted by Chance Hunter at November 23, 2004 11:48 AM | More Health Science Ethics articles ]

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