November 2, 2009 Red tape holds up Protein Sciences' H1N1 vaccine Play video

(NECN: Brian Burnell, Hartford, Conn.) - When it comes to vaccinating people against the H1N1 or swine flu one word stands out -- frustrated.

"We know people are frustrated," Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said.

"We share the frustrations of Americans who are eagar to be vaccinated," Health and Humans Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said.

"The president has been and is frustrated," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said.

Frustrated by the low number of doses available and the struggle manufacturers to make more. They promised 40-million doses by Halloween. Just 28-million are actually available.

"The problem is really eggs. Eggs simply can't work for a pandemic," Dan Adams of Protein Sciences Corp. said.

To make the vaccine you need the virus. Flu virus is grown in chicken eggs and it takes time to grow enough virus to make vaccine. With normal flu virus you get one dose per egg. Not with H1N1.

"Instead of taking one egg per dose it probably takes in the neighborhood of two or three or maybe more eggs per dose and there's only so many eggs you can process per day so the yields go way down," Adams said. "The amount of vaccine available is much lower."

But not at Adams' company, Protein Sciences. They manufacture vaccine differently using genetic engineering and killed virus.

"We are able to work not from a live flu virus. That means we don't have to get a flu virus to grow in

"We have enough capacity to make several million doses right now in our current facility," Trey McPherson of Protein Sciences Corp. said.

What's holding up Protein Sciences is red tape. The Food and Drug Administration decided to go with only licensed facilities to make the vaccine. Most of those companies are overseas. Protein Sciences has applied for a license but has been put off. It looks like they might be approved in January. Adams sees a potential problem if only overseas vaccine makers produce swine flu vaccine.

"If we had a real pandemic, then it would a huge problem, because politically it would be impossible for these huge companies to agree to export their flu vaccine," Adams said.

If you missed NECN's special H1N1: What You Need to Know, you can watch it in its entirety by visiting your Comcast On Demand menu, clicking "get local," then "local networks," then "NECN." It will be available through the end of November. You can also watch segments of the program on NECN.com's H1N1 Latest News page.