The wait for vaccine to protect against the H1N1 flu is just about over for some folks, but others won’t have a shot at the shots for a while yet.

Health officials have been racing to get the vaccine out before the winter flu season begins in earnest. Indeed, the flu strain popularly — if incorrectly — referred to as “swine flu” really didn’t let up through the summer, intensifying worries about how widespread it might be this autumn and winter.

The first doses of the vaccine have begun arriving, but initially those first shipments are targeted at the population at highest risk of serious effects from the H1N1 flu.

For now, that means children and young adults between the ages of 2 and 24.

That makes sense, and the rest of us can exercise some patience while more doses become available. Being patient, that is, but still taking steps to ward off the seasonal flu, for which shots are widely available.

“Vaccines are the most powerful public health tool for controlling influenza, and it is critical that as many persons in the target groups for the vaccine receive the doses that are available as soon as possible,” Durham County Public Health Director Gayle Harris told a news conference Monday.

Harris and others also tried to head off public fear over the vaccine.

“We understand that concern,” Cameron Wolfe, an infectious disease specialist at the Duke University Health System, noted at the press conference. “But parents really need to weigh the risk of the vaccine against the risk of getting the flu. We believe the risk of getting the flu is much worse.”

So if you’re in the priority age group, or are the parent of a child in that group, move quickly to get the shot. And others should as soon as they become available.