Oxford has been hit by a shortage of yellow fever vaccines which has seen one traveller forced to go to Reading for his immunisation.

John Kilgour, 29, of Howard Street, east Oxford, who is due to fly to Trinidad in about a week's time, made an appointment with his GP at Bartlemas Surgery, in Iffley Road, on April 19 to have the necessary injections.

After having his typhoid jab he was told there were no yellow fever vaccination supplies.

A nurse at the surgery called other Oxford GPs, who were also out of the vaccine.

Mr Kilgour said: "I was told to phone around the private hospitals. I called quite a few in Oxford and was told the same thing by all of them - that they had no yellow fever vaccine because a batch had been delayed in France.

"There was a problem with the packaging.

He added: "I was told to try Bristol, but they didn't even have it there.

"I was even told to have it done out there and just dose myself up with mosquito stuff and hope for the best.

"The vaccination takes 10 days to be effective and yellow fever can be fatal!"

Mr Kilgour eventually got his immunisation at a private clinic called Masa, in Reading, on April 22.

Maggie Perrin, practice manager at Bartlemas Surgery said: "There has been a shortage of the vaccine nationally. We have an order with the vaccine company, Sanofi Pasteur, but they can't fulfil that order because they they haven't got the supplies. I don't think we are any different to other practices in the area."

Richard Stubbins, managing director of Sanofi Pasteur, said: "There were two suppliers of yellow fever vaccine in the UK -- ourselves and Chiron Vaccines. Chiron Vaccines have stopped supplying yellow fever vaccines and we now find ourselves having to do what we can to fill the gap.

"A vaccine is a biological product - it takes many months to make. We are doing everything we can."

He added: "There is a shortage nationally and throughout the world.

"It's going to be difficult for some time until production is enlarged."

Mr Stubbins said that many batches of the vaccination produced in France by Sanofi Pasteur, had been rejected by GPs and private clinics because they had French packaging and a vial instead of syringes.

Medicines with foreign packaging are not licensed in the UK, but Sanofi Pasteur has applied for an exemption.

Yellow fever vaccine with UK packaging will be supplied early next month.