Editorial: Clinic kills one excuse for flu shot delinquency

Honk if you love flu shots. OK, nobody loves them, but when you can get one without leaving your car, that’s awfully convenient.

On Saturday, motorists were able to roll down their windows and roll up their sleeves to get a seasonal flu shot, thanks to the Spokane Regional Health District. A quick check of the Internet shows that these mobile vaccination clinics are becoming an epidemic around the country.

Smart idea.

Kudos to the district and the students from the Washington State University College of Pharmacy, WSU College of Nursing and Spokane Community College nursing program for their participation. The students not only made the clinic possible, they received valuable training.

Hundreds of cars ran the gantlet of stations set up at a Mirabeau Point parking lot near the Spokane Valley YMCA. This was the only drive-through clinic this year because the district wants to assess effectiveness before increasing frequency.

But it holds great promise in raising the region’s immunization rate. Any tactic that gets individuals inoculated against the flu is good for the general public.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that everyone age 6 months and older receive the flu vaccine, but many people ignore this advice because they find it to be a hassle.

Many workplaces offer shots, which is convenient for busy workers. So extending access elsewhere makes sense, even if it means setting up clinics in parking lots.

“It seems pretty convenient,” one shot recipient told The Spokesman-Review.

“I’d probably rather do it like this.”

The good news is that most people will need only one shot, unlike last year, when the H1N1 virus was spreading. That strain is included in this year’s shot.

Though the drive-through experiment has ended, the health district has arranged a number of walk-in clinics at schools and YMCAs throughout the fall. The schedule is available at the district’s website, www.srhd.org.

We hope the district will continue to look for creative ways to expand access to flu shots. Wider immunization decreases the chances of catching a miserable and potentially dangerous disease.

Better to be stuck with a needle than stuck with the flu.