Shanghai will start free A/H1N1 inoculations on pregnant women within a week.

They should have pregnancies registered and receive a registration booklet from their communities, the Shanghai Health Bureau said yesterday.

The free shots will be available for both permanent city residents and women from other provinces if they have registration booklets.

There are about 180,000 eligible women in Shanghai.

Each city district will designate at least one maternity or child-health hospital as temporary swine-flu vaccination centers.

Detailed guidance and education will be available at all facilities offering maternity outpatient services and health-care information for pregnant women.

Healthy pregnant women who have no vaccination minuses, such as egg allergy, cold, fever, acute illnesses or severe overall allergies, are the prime candidates for shots.

Staff training

The bureau said women with pregnancy-related complications and a history of repeated miscarriages should delay being inoculated.

Each district-based health bureau is carrying out staff training on vaccine injections, solutions to adverse reactions and first aid at the designated centers.

"All relevant staff at vaccination spots must first pass an official examination," said Song Guofan, an official from the bureau. "Every district must enhance reporting of adverse reactions.

"An emergency treatment system, with experienced doctors, must be established in every region to give quick and effective therapy."

Women must take their pregnancy registration booklet, identity card and signed vaccination agreement to receive the injections.

Women wary

Since the Ministry of Health announced that pregnant women were included on the free swine-flu shot list on December 11, about 1,400 on the mainland had been vaccinated with no serious adverse reactions as of December 31.

The ministry said in December that 13.7 percent of swine-flu fatalities on the mainland were pregnant women.

Chen Daning, an official from the Shanghai International Peace Maternity and Child Health Hospital, said vaccination was an effective measure to protect pregnant women from the virus.

However, some pregnant women are wary.

"It is a new vaccine and there have been reports of adverse reactions," said Bai Yu, a city woman who is three months' pregnant.

"I don't want to take any risks ... I will discuss it with my doctor."

So far about 1.4 million people, deemed as the most at-risk sections of the population, have received the shots.