Australia's first pandemic influenza mass vaccination clinic exercise: Hunter New England Area Health Service, NSW, Australia

In 2009 a novel influenza strain, pandemic influenza A H1N1 California 7/09 (pH1N1), “swine flu”, emerged worldwide. Australia rapidly developed a pH1N1-specific vaccine which was distributed to public health services and general practices in September 2009. Should a second severe pandemic wave affect Australia there may be a need to rapidly deliver vaccine through mass vaccination clinics. Mass clinics must be efficient and safe. In 2008 a field exercise was undertaken to simulate a pandemic mass vaccination clinic using seasonal influenza vaccination in a rural community in the Hunter Valley using the New South Wales mass vaccination clinic response protocols. The exercise identified significant opportunities to streamline operations to increase clinic capacity, reduce client throughput time, enhance involvement of external agencies, and modify clinic roles, with a resulting revision of the State mass vaccination plan.