Unlike most other childhood vaccines, there's no financial incentive to provide influenza notifications to the AIR
Not all immunisation providers are reporting paediatric flu vaccines to the Australian Immunisation record (AIR) with experts claiming coverage data may not reflect the true vaccination rate.
A perspective published today in the MJA said national influenza vaccine coverage for young children last year increased to 25.6%, which was five-fold higher than in 2017. But Dr Frank Beard, co-author of the perspective and a public health physician at Westmead Children’s Hospital in Sydney, said this data did not reflect the true coverage.
Unlike most other childhood vaccines, providers are not given a financial incentive to provide influenza notifications to the AIR.
“Despite recommendations to enter all vaccines administered onto the AIR, anecdotal evidence suggests that some providers may omit to do so specifically for the influenza vaccine,” Dr Beard said.
Another reason for under-reporting could be an incompatibility between practice management systems and the AIR, he said.
Immunisation providers are being encouraged to offer flu vaccines for children aged six months to under five years, as young children are the most likely group to be hospitalised if they contract the disease.
The surge in flu vaccinations for young children in 2018 was likely prompted by heightened awareness of the flu after the particularly severe season the year before, the authors said.
This also prompted the states and territories to fund widespread flu vaccination programs for this age group, but the authors said a routine nationally funded program would reduce confusion over the importance of the vaccine for young children.
MJA 2019, 29 April
