Richmond residents with underlying health problems, including asthma, are encouraged to speak to their physicians to discuss a strategy in the event they come down with H1N1, Richmond’s chief medical health officer said Thursday.

“Those with chronic conditions like asthma, and diabetes and a number of others...does put them at higher risk for severe H1N1 complications, and we do encourage them to be vaccinated,” Dr. James Lu said.

An article posted Thursday on the Canadian Medical Association Journal, found that hospitalized children with H1N1 who were studied were significantly older than those with seasonal flu, and more than three quarters had underlying medical conditions.

“They were also significantly more likely to have asthma than those with seasonal influenza,” the article on www.cmaj.ca states.

On Thursday, the province made the H1N1 vaccine fully available to the general population, after at first being open to at-risk groups before slowly being expanded to others.

But a lack of demand prompted the restrictions to be lifted, now allowing everyone, including those between 19 and 65, to receive an inoculation.

Lu said locals with underlying conditions can be proactive by speaking to their family physician and making plans in the event they come down with the swine flu.

“You should go and contact your family physician and discuss your condition and if you’re in that higher group, what we’ve been encouraging the physicians to do is to have some prearrangements. For example, some of the physicians may look at giving the person...a prescription for Tamiflu, the antivirals, to be on hand and they would check back with them if they have symptoms.”

But Lu said his best advice for those with chronic conditions is that they be vaccinated.

“That is the best way to protect themselves.”

Healthy people without any underlying conditions should not, Lu said, badger their physicians for a prescription for Tamiflu.“We are still very concerned about the development of resistance across the board and we would like to promote judicious use of the antiviral,” he said.

Lu said that H1N1 cases seem to have already peaked, but he’s concerned about a third wave, and so is urging everyone to be vaccinated.