LONDON, Oct 6 (AFP) - Doctors in Britain warned Wednesday that a decision to suspend the manufacturing license of a major flu vaccine supplier could lead to shortages of the vaccine in Britain.
Chiron Vaccines, a US company whose Fluvirin is manufactured in Britain, said Tuesday it would not supply any batches of the vaccine around the world this winter after its license was suspended by British regulators over manufacturing problems.
That decision, which slaps a three-year ban on the company, caused alarm in the US market where the drug provides up to half of all winter vaccinations.
The health department in Britain, where Fluvirin accounted for only 2.4 million of the 14 million doses ordered for the season, reassured patients that contingency plans were in place to secure flu jab doses from other sources.
But the British Medical Association (BMA) said that shortages of vaccines could hit parts of the country which had been due to receive supplies from Chiron.
Doctor Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the BMA's general practitioner's committee, said: "This will have a significant impact on the flu immunization program in this country and the impact will be patchy.
"This is because practices tend to get their whole flu vaccine supply from one supplier.
"Those practices affected by the shortage will have to cancel flu immunization clinics until doses come through.
"We are in contact with the government to establish what they intend to do about this supply problem," he said.
The government's annual flu immunization drive, which targets at-risk groups including the elderly and people with long-term conditions, was launched on Monday.
The health department's Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) suspended Chiron production for "three months with immediate effect" after uncovering unspecified sterility defects in the Liverpool plant, which makes all of its Fluvirin(R).
It found that an estimated 50 million of the flu vaccines were contaminated and did not meet "product sterility specifications".
The World Health Organization warned that the suspension could have a major effect in other countries as the flu season was just starting.
Chiron Vaccines, based in Oxford, is the world's fifth-largest vaccines business with facilities across Europe, the United States and Asia.
It is the world's second-largest manufacturer of flu vaccines and is also a major supplier of meningitis and travel vaccines.