Central New York parents of infants and young children are doing all they can to protect them from the respiratory infection RSV, including vaccination. There’s a severe shortage of the vaccine in the region, and Senator Chuck Schumer is stepping in to try and fix the problem.
Melanie Berry’s son Gary has already faced his share of challenges in his young life, including chemotherapy for leukemia and open-heart surgery to treat a congenital heart condition. So, she knew he was especially vulnerable to RSV. In late 2022 when he was two, Gary was denied an expensive drug to protect him from the virus, but he became infected and ended up fighting for his life for weeks in the ICU. Berry says he pulled through, but she wants to ensure that other families don’t endure the same trauma.
“He was unnecessarily sick, he didn't have to be that sick," Berry said. "And no mother should have to watch their child go through that. No child should have to endure that when we have things that can prevent that.”
Senator Chuck Schumer says the severe illness and potential death posed by RSV is avoidable.
“We can't let this become even more of a crisis," Schumer said. "We can't let out the ICU's here in Central New York be overrun with infants with RSV when we have the tools to avoid it.”
Schumer stopped at SUNY Upstate Monday to call on federal agencies and drug makers to speed up production and then get the vaccine to areas seeing a shortage.
Upstate Pediatric infectious disease specialist Dr. Jana Shaw says RSV infections have soared since September.
"We have seen hundreds of children who either were seen at the clinic at Upstate and surrounding clinics for RSV because parents were concerned children couldn't breathe or couldn't eat," Shaw said. "Hundreds of children were hospitalized at Golisano Children's Hospital and numerous numbers of children ended up in intensive care."
Dr. Ofrona Reid is Interim President and CEO of Syracuse Community Health Center, which serves a mostly uninsured and disadvantaged population. He says they’ve had to triage vaccine doses for those with chronic respiratory infection.
"Parents get really upset and angry that we're pretty much neglecting their child from receiving a vaccine, because we have to pick and choose," Reid said. "Of course, to them, it's not fair. They want their child to be protected like any other child."
Reid says it's discouraging to doctors and nurses who've sworn to care for patients at all costs.
He says his clinics see 20 to 30 babies per day who need the RSV vaccine. But they’ve only received 30 total doses despite placing orders for hundreds.
