Aventis finds 2.6 million more flu shot doses

Aventis-Pasteur said on Tuesday it had squeezed out an extra 2.6 million doses of flu vaccine beyond what the company already has promised.

This will give the United States a total of 58 million doses of influenza vaccine this year, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson told a news conference.

With MedImmune Inc.'s 2 million doses of inhaled FluMist vaccine, this provides 60 million doses total for the year, he said.

This still leaves the country with far fewer than the 100 million doses planned for this season, but plugs some of the hole left when Chiron Corp. lost the license for its British vaccine plant in Liverpool.

Aventis-Pasteur had previously said it could provide 55.4 million doses to the United States for the current flu season. Aventis chairman David Williams said the company had excess production of two of the three strains of influenza included in this year's formulation and could produce new doses of the third strain to deliver the extra vaccines by January.

"We will in fact be able to produce 2.6 million doses of additional vaccine and get them into the distribution network in the first two weeks of January," Williams told the news conference. "This brings our total supply to 58 million doses for the year."