By Rhiannon Meyers
The Daily News
Published November 19, 2009

The Galveston County Health District has leased two billboards to advertise swine flu prevention.

The health district leased the billboards — one on Interstate 45 and the other on state Highway 146 — using federal public health education funds, spokesman Kurt Koopmann said.

The advertisements are meant to provide information about the H1N1 virus and offer simple tips on how to stop the spread of the flu, Koopmann said.

Last month, the county distributed more than 5,400 doses of the vaccine during a two-day period at Mall of the Mainland.

This week, the health district began distributing 2,400 more doses of the swine flu vaccine, and as of Wednesday, 1,129 doses have been administered, Koopmann said.

The health district had planed to set aside 1,600 of those doses for children who had been given the shot before because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends young children get two shots.

“We reduced the number of those set aside for kids that will need a second shot to 1,000 based on information received from the state that we will be receiving another vaccine shipment in the near future,” Koopmann said.

“Doing that means 600 additional doses were available this week.”

Koopmann said the health district expects to have more doses available for children by Nov. 30.

Thus far, two people in the county, a 48-year-old man from Galveston and a 31-year-old Galveston woman, have died as a result of swine flu.

 

Kurt Koopmann