TORONTO — With a massive shortage of influenza vaccine in the United States, Americans living near the border may be contemplating a cross-border trip for a flu shot this fall.

But the president of the Canadian Medical Association urged Canadian doctors to remember their first duty this influenza season is to their own patients.

"The vaccine shortage problem . . . that they now have in the States or elsewhere in the world is not for us here to fix or sort out," Dr. Albert Schumacher said in an interview Friday.

Schumacher warned that, in particular, doctors on this side of the border shouldn't put vaccine purchased by provincial and territorial governments - the bulk of the vaccine available in Canada - into the arms of non-residents.

"The stuff that's sitting in my fridge isn't for them," Schumacher said flatly.