There is a flu vaccine shortage for staff at Windsor Regional Hospital.
Vice-President of Critical Care, Regional Stroke, Cardiology, Trauma and Clinical Support Services, Karen Riddell says the flu vaccine is available for patients but the vaccine is not in stock for the staff.
She says the hospital has more than 4,000 staff members but says there are manufacturing issues along with shipment problems.
"We only actually received about 262 doses for staff so those have all been administered," says Riddell. "We have no more on hand for staff and we're not expecting another delivery until November 15th."
Riddell says vaccine for staff and patients must be kept separately.
"We do still have on hand though for patients, we get those separately, so we have to keep them separate," she says. So we have about 90 vaccines left for patients and zero right now for employees."
Until the next flu vaccine shipment arrives, hospital is asking staff to get the flu shot at an area pharmacy or visit their family physician.
Health officials around the world have been warning this could be a bad flu season.
Predictions are based on what happens in Australia and this year, Australia was hit early and hard.
Typically the peak period for the flu in this area is from January to March, but given what happened in Australia, Windsor Regional Hospital CEO David Musyj said in September that it's possible that it may peak earlier than that here in Windsor-Essex.