The Greater East Liberty Vaccination Coalition

The impending Swine Flu crisis has brought to the forefront the value of immunizations. The federal governmental is moving quickly to develop an effective vaccine for this flu strain.

Presently, childhood vaccines do exist for many serious diseases and sicknesses. Unfortunately, even with the hard fought efforts of our school district officials and Health Department 100's of our youth have failed to acquire needed vaccines.

On Monday, May 11, beginning at 8:30 a.m., Dr Bruce Dixon will provide opening remarks at a "Vaccination Meeting" at the Bloomfield-Garfield Community Center, 113 N. Pacific Ave. (corner of Dearborn), in Garfield. Dr. Dixon will address the new requirements for childhood vaccinations. Youth who do not have the required vaccination in place will not be able to enter school in the fall.

Working in partnership with the Allegheny County Health Department and Pittsburgh Public Schools, we are seeking to form a collaborative effort that will work toward ensuring that all East End children have their required vaccinations in place for the beginning of the 2009/2010 school year.

If you have any organizational or personal engagement with groups of young people in the East End, we asked that you attend the meeting. We hope to develop an action plan that will result in engaging youth so that they will have their require vaccinations by the beginning of the school year. For more information or to RSVP to this meeting, contact Rick Flanagan at the Bloomfield-Garfield Corp: RickF@bloomfield-garfield.org or 412-441-9833.