Tornado Alley (PROG)

[ed_ferrari]

Vaccine seekers don't blame Bush

Seniors waiting in line in Urbandale do complain about the shortage, though.

By TONY LEYS
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
October 21, 2004

Anyone hunting for an infusion of votes Wednesday outside an Urbandale flu shot clinic would have been sorely disappointed.

Inside the Urbandale Senior Center, nurses were injecting precious flu vaccine into arms. A few hundred people, mostly senior citizens, were lined up down the hall and out the front door, where they waited up to a half hour in the damp, cool parking lot.

Grumbles were common. "I'm probably going to die of double pneumonia before I get in there for a flu shot," said a gray-haired man near the back of the line.

But few were buying Democratic claims that President Bush was at fault for a sudden nationwide shortage of vaccine.

"Oh, for Pete's sake," said Janet Emerick of West Des Moines. "Give me a break. Criminy."

Emerick, 71, plans to vote for Bush next month. She called the shortage "absolutely ridiculous" and said she wants the government to find better vaccine suppliers than the British plant that caused the problem by producing millions of tainted, unusable doses. But like many people in line, including some Democrats, she said it was a stretch to blame the president.

Bush's Democratic opponent, Sen. John Kerry, has been campaigning on the issue. He says Bush should have fixed the nation's fragile vaccine-distribution system before this fall's crisis struck.

Bush said that his administration has spent tens of millions of dollars improving the system, and that the government is doing all it can to ease the problems. He contends that fear of unreasonable lawsuits has helped discourage drugmakers from manufacturing the vaccine.

Many folks standing in line at the senior center said they weren't interested in who was pointing fingers at whom.

Bob Trotter, 67, of Johnston was among those who said the national system needs improvement. But he said he didn't think Kerry would gain much politically from the issue.

"If you're going to blame Bush for something like this, you're going to blame him for every little thing," he said.

Trotter was one of many people in line supporting the president. That's not surprising, considering that Republicans outnumber Democrats in the suburb.

But even a sprinkling of Kerry supporters expressed skepticism about the argument. Jodie McKay, 78, of Des Moines, said government officials should have known that such a shortage was possible. "But I don't think it's going to be much of an issue" in the campaign, she said.

http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041021/LIFE02/410210393/1042