Flu Pandemic Coming, U.S. Not Prepared

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/03/050325200256.htm

Flu Pandemic Coming, U.S. Not Prepared

2005-04-01

Immediate action is needed to prepare the United States for a deadly pandemic of influenza, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) is telling policymakers.

In meetings with congressional and administration leaders, IDSA has explained that the H5N1 “bird flu” spreading in Asia has the potential to develop into a pandemic like the one that claimed more than half a million American lives in 1918. Even if this strain does not emerge as a pandemic, infectious disease experts agree that another flu pandemic is just around the corner. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) predicts even a “mild” pandemic could kill at least 100,000 people if the nation is not prepared.

“This year’s serious problems with flu vaccine supply showed us just how unprepared we are,” says Andrew T. Pavia, chair of IDSA’s Pandemic Influenza Task Force. “If this had been a pandemic year, we would have been in serious trouble. Now is the time to fix these problems and develop the ability to respond, before the pandemic strikes.”

<SNIP>

Just, yikes. Captain Trips anyone? Sometimes I almost wish we could rid the world of all the evil that's rife here now and just start over. It sure would help the earth itself recover a little bit.

I recently discovered that my grandmother was a nurse at Beloit Hospital during the Spanish Flu.

I'm amazed she made it through with no problems, and that she lived to give birth to my dad, or I wouldn't be here.

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This isn't a "slate-wiper" we're talking about.

But it's still an abomination that we aren't preparing ourselves for it. There's no excuse for a country with our resources to be unprepared for this kind of thing.

We are going to have to dispose 15 million dead people in very short order...

Big enough.

Thermal depolymerization. Turn 'em into oil!

So that's why they're not doing anything...

...bacterial pneumonia for which there was no treatment in 1918-1919. We now have antibiotics to treat bacterial pneumonia with a three day regime. Why try and scare people for no good reason?

Don

does not speak to WHY anybody died! Now you might argue that the proportion who die will be nothing like 1918, that is not what I was talking about.

But the companies that make vaccines and their stockholders sure would like you to think different. More people die every year in America from getting hit by lightning as do every year in the entire world from bird flu. Now on the other hand if you happen to be a bird you may want to be worried.

Don

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/updates/en/

I don't have as much faith in modern medicine as you do, I think.

We had rush him to the hospital. After a few days of antibiotics he can outrun me now. In 1918-1919 we would have buried him by now. On Freerepublic if you try and argue this point with them they pull your post immediately. (I know from experience) Lots of them boys got stock in drug companies. They are praying for the bird flu to spread. They have a lot of money invested in this scam.

Don

don't work on viruses.

Many Americans are not-very-well-versed on the difference between bacteria and viruses, and when antibiotics are appropriate.

Didn't mean to be condescending. :-)

The speculation is the virus killed those at the prime of life because is that that group has the strongest immune system, and it was the immune reaction that killed them.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6315717/site/newsweek /

<snip>The 1918 flu—variant H1N1—spread with terrifying speed; in six days at a single Army base, Barry writes, the hospital census went from 610 to more than 4,000. It killed with devastating swiftness: pedestrians literally collapsed in the street; people woke up healthy and were dead by nightfall. It attacked multiple organs in the body, but always the respiratory system first, laying waste to the defenses by which the body keeps pathogens out of the lungs. Most victims succumbed to a secondary infection of bacterial pneumonia, for which there was no treatment in 1918. But in other cases, the virus was fatal in itself. Multiplying explosively throughout the respiratory tract, it provoked an immune response so furious that it devastated the lung's delicate tissues. And it was those deaths that explained H1N1's unique terror. Influenza typically kills the very young and the old, whose immune systems are too weak to fight it off, but Spanish flu killed young men and women in the prime of life.

Barry noted another cause for concern: The people who die during a bout of today's flu are overwhelmingly the victims of a secondary bacterial pneumonia, which only gains a foothold in the lungs after the flu virus has softened things up. In 1918–1919, however, an estimated half of all deaths were caused by a killer viral pneumonia known as acute respiratory distress syndrome, or ARDS, a massive primary infection usually fatal within 3–4 days. Barry said that even the best-equipped ICUs of today still routinely lose 60 percent of ARDS patients.

http://www.jhsph.edu/PublicHealthNews/articles/2005/great_influenza.html

The key to the 1918 strain’s deadliness seems to be the effect of its H protein on molecules that are part of the host’s immune response, called pro-inflammatory cytokines. The severity of many viral diseases results from over-induction of this immune response (New Scientist print edition, 6 September, 2003).

Kawaoka’s team found that hybrid viruses carrying 1918 H induced cytokines that activated a class of white blood cells called macrophages. It also attracted white blood cells called neutrophils into the alveoli, or air sacs, of the lungs. There, instead of just fighting infected cells, they caused runaway damage to lung tissue.

The team warns that viruses equipped with a similar H could still be circulating among wild birds. And there may be little protection if it ever invades humans again. Kawaoka’s team found that, while people who experienced the 1918 flu have antibodies that neutralise the reconstructed 1918 H, people immune to currently-circulating flu viruses - even of the same family as the 1918 strain - have almost no protection

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6502

It came from this book:

http://www.bookbrowse.com/index.cfm?page=title&titleID=1367

It just makes more sense. Today up to 70% of those who get the avian flu die from it. It is certain that antibiotics are available to those people, but it is the virus that kills them, not a secondary infection.

What is not known is how many cases of bird flu have not been reported? In other words how many people who have contracted the illness and have only had minor symptoms of the virus recovered on their own without ever seeking any medical care? It may be hundreds, thousands, or many more. We just don't know the answer to that question. Take care.

Don

The H5N1 virus does not usually infect humans. In 1997, however, the first case of spread from a bird to a human was seen during an outbreak of bird flu in poultry in Hong Kong. The virus caused severe respiratory illness in 18 people, 6 of whom died. Since that time, there have been other cases of H5N1 infection among humans. Most recently, human cases of H5N1 infection have occurred in Thailand and Vietnam during large H5N1 outbreaks in poultry. The death rate for these reported cases has been about 70 percent. Most of these cases occurred from contact with infected poultry or contaminated surfaces; however, it is thought that a few cases of human-to-human spread of H5N1 have occurred.

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/gen-info/facts.htm

Heck if it was around the 5% found in 1918 it would still be a horrific disaster.

The point that they aren't counting what they don't know doesn't further the argument. What is known is counted, what is counted is horrific, minimizing it may ease your concern, but it doesn't ease mine.

It struck with amazing speed, often killing its victims within just hours of the first signs of infection. So fast did the 1918 strain overwhelm the body's natural defenses, that the usual cause of death in influenza patients---a secondary infection of lethal pneumonia---oftentimes never had a chance to establish itself. Instead, the virus caused an uncontrollable hemorrhaging that filled the lungs, and patients would drown in their own body fluids.

www.ninthday.com/spanish_flu.htm

Living in a city with a great Medical Center--where hospitals can be put on "drive by" status during a bad cold season--I lack your confidence in today's medical care. The system can be overwhelmed. Of course, the poor all over the world will suffer the worst.

3rd year medical student's are not even close to being a doctor.
From your link below the paragraph you copied and pasted:

--Isaac Starr, 3rd year medical student, University of Pennsylvania, 1918.

The reason that a 3rd year medical student was even treating patients was because there were not enough real doctors to go around in 1918. Anyone could treat patients and act like doctor in 1918.

Don

Not the part I pasted.

Where is YOUR source that indicates bacterial pneumonia was the main cause of death for victims of the 1919 Influenza pandemic?

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6315717/site/newsweek /

<snip>The 1918 flu—variant H1N1—spread with terrifying speed; in six days at a single Army base, Barry writes, the hospital census went from 610 to more than 4,000. It killed with devastating swiftness: pedestrians literally collapsed in the street; people woke up healthy and were dead by nightfall. It attacked multiple organs in the body, but always the respiratory system first, laying waste to the defenses by which the body keeps pathogens out of the lungs. Most victims succumbed to a secondary infection of bacterial pneumonia, for which there was no treatment in 1918. But in other cases, the virus was fatal in itself. Multiplying explosively throughout the respiratory tract, it provoked an immune response so furious that it devastated the lung's delicate tissues. And it was those deaths that explained H1N1's unique terror. Influenza typically kills the very young and the old, whose immune systems are too weak to fight it off, but Spanish flu killed young men and women in the prime of life.

So, those who live long enough to develop pneumonia may be cured if they get medical help.

But in other cases, the virus was fatal in itself. Multiplying explosively throughout the respiratory tract, it provoked an immune response so furious that it devastated the lung's delicate tissues. And it was those deaths that explained H1N1's unique terror. Influenza typically kills the very young and the old, whose immune systems are too weak to fight it off, but Spanish flu killed young men and women in the prime of life.

Looks like a walk in the park.

...the the elderly had been exposed to earlier strains of a similar type of flu and were therefore somewhat immunized from the 1918-1919 version of the flu.

Again it was only theory, but it kind of makes sense if you think about it. But I would not bet the farm that was the case. I personally think there were many different factors involved.

Don

He is quoting from one paragraph of "The Great Influenza" by John M Barry. However, Barry makes clear in the book that that the killer of the young was the flu itself, not secondary infections. The rest of the poster's stuff, about selective exposure is speculation with no data to back it up.

The full book from which he quotes is at odds with the use to which that poster is trying to use it. In fact, the first few pages of his Afterword, at the end of the book, discuss the possibility of a new epidemic.

nevertheless, it was a HUGE portion of the population at the time. More of our men were killed by it than in World War I, which was also ongoing.

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If so, I'm going to get the vaccine in a few days and have my family get shots, also.

Will anything be better for this year's normal flu shots? Whistle softly while staring at ceiling.

Will we trust the Bush WH not to use disreputable single source Brits- again? Bush can't fix anything but elections.

The flu that became widespread this season (California flu) was a different flu than the vaccine was for. And California flu first appeared in mid September 2004, and was widespread in the US by January. There simply was not enough time to make a vaccine.

To make a vaccine against ABF, first it needs to mutate to an easily transmissible human-to-human form, then it has to be isolated, then the vaccine prepared in massive quantities. By that time, if it is fast spreading, it is already knocking at your door.

Further, there have been problems in working with H5N1 to make vaccines. Flu vaccines are made by injecting the virus into LIVE chicken eggs. But the H5N1 virus is so bad that it kills the eggs - no vaccine.

This is from a radio show interviewing Dr. Henry Niman, archived at:
http://mp3.rbnlive.com/Darrell05.html

Bird flu epidemic fears - Expert opinion and current research
March 31, 2005
Pig Disease Information Centre UK - Dr. Michael Meredith
A documentary on United Kingdom TV last night reviewed international expert opinion on the H5N1 strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza. There was a unanimous opinion that the threat of a human epidemic is real and imminent as a result of three epidemiological reflections of changes in this virus over the past 8 years:
1. Increasing geographic spread of outbreaks
2. Endemic (enzootic) establishment of the virus in both domestic and wild bird populations
3. Widening host range (pigs, cats, ferrets, humans)
These trends are in themselves foreboding enough, especially when the virulence of this H5N1 virus strain for humans appears to be so far undiminished at 50-70%, but the final factor which seals the inevitability of future genetic mutation and spread of the H5N1 virus are the lifestyle factors and poverty in many of the currently affected countries in S.E.
Asia. The programme showed overcrowded and closely intermingled populations
of people, chickens, ducks and pigs. Also shown were people eating raw duck's blood soup (a gastronomic delicacy in some regions!) and live animal and bird markets with livestock overcrowded and stressed. Our own correspondent in Hong Kong reports that live birds are again being sold in markets, despite the temporary ban implemented following the human deaths there in the 1990s. Live birds are also being imported into Hong Kong from southern China. A local expert on the BBC programme predicted that a more human-adapted mutated strain of influenza could be around the world within two weeks.
The experts interviewed did not place much faith in vaccination because of limited availability, especially in the countries most at risk of an epidemic starting. The impossibility of predicting the exact antigenic genetic form of a more human-adapted mutant also made vaccine stocks a hit-or-miss proposition.
Current research programs into the Bird 'flu problem are working on improved
vaccine development. A research project was shown which is combining H5N1
with human influenza strains under laboratory conditions in order to predict
the form and behavior that a recombination virus (potentially resulting from
dual infection of a person or pig with a common human and an avian influenza
strain) might take. More about H5N1 HPAI in poultry, humans and swine at
<www.pighealth.com/influenza2.htm>

And many have no clue how to react to an outbreak, the training and the resources just aren't available. Even if homeland security efforts were adequately funded, there is no guarantee the money would be spent on any public health issue. Adopting these suggestions would go far in protecting the public from many potential public health crises whether from natural disease pandemics, terrorist acts, or other disasters.

Something as simple as having vaccine production in the United States seems to be beyond this administration's understanding. This is irresponsible. But, then, I guess I just don't understand the value and efficacy of "market forces". And they claim to have the best intentions and are doing everything possible to protect us. Because...because George "cares" about our country, about... about the well being and...and SAFETY of the American people. Right :eyes:

from the article:
"Also, the United States does not have the manufacturing capacity to produce enough vaccine and antivirals to meet its needs in a pandemic. Tax credits should be offered to encourage companies to build new manufacturing facilities in this country so that the United States is not dependent on foreign suppliers. Tax incentives and patent extensions should be available for companies that research and develop new anti-flu therapies."

and inquired on the vaccination trials concerning this. I am not sure whether or not to participate in the study or not.

Others may have other information from their local doctors/pharmacists--but this is the information that I gleaned from calling around:

Tamiflu is supposed to knock out the flu in 2-3 days and lessen the severity of symptoms.

I understand that bird flu is a nasty, awful flu--more severe that your garden-variety flu that takes you out for 5 days or so. Tamiflu would not knock it out, but it could give someone an increased chance to fight it off--and avoid death.

I called a couple of pharmacists in our area and also spoke with some nurses also.

The pharmacists said that SOME doctors will give patients pre-emptive Tamiflu prescriptions. If you want to have a few doses on hand, in the medicine cabinet--your best bet is to find a doctor who will do this for you. It might take a while to find a doctor who will. The pharmacist said that the majority of doctors will not do this.

The nurses I spoke with said the same thing.

What I learned is that, the time is now, to start looking for a doctor who will do this for you--if you want Tamiflu in preparation for this flu or any other. If the flu does hit, chances are everyone will want Tamiflu.

I'm not a doctor. I only spoke with a couple of health professionals in my area. So, if others have additional or conflicting information about Tamilflu--please feel free to respond or to correct me.

I just thought I would let others know what I have learned.

www.tamiflu.com

Tamiflu is made by Roche Laboratories.

Here is an excerpt from their web page:

Compensation and Benefits
In addition to a competitive compensation and rewards system, including a Special Recognition Awards Program for exceptional performance, Roche provides comprehensive medical, prescription, dental, vision, savings (401k with company match), retirement and life insurance plans. The medical plan also provides Domestic Partner benefits and certain infertility benefits, including in vitro fertilization.

More:
http://www.rocheusa.com/career/careers_subwecanoffer.asp

Yes, that's right. Roche "supports the homosexual agenda" and they kill babies by encouraging the production of extra embryos left-over from in vitro fertilization.

Please tell all conservative fundies that they need to boycott this company and let the godless liberals have all the Tamiflu they want.

Personally, I'm going to ask my doctor to allow me to keep Tamiflu on-hand so that I can both protect my family and contribute to the downfall of western "civilization" by supporting equality for gay people.

Who gives a damn about a disease that could kill millions when we can spend all of our legislative energies trying to save a person who is already dead?

Would they become a vector? Would I have to stop feeding them?

Maybe this is a stupid question. Just wondering... :shrug:

You probably won't get it from wild birds, but concentrating wild birds could help it to spread faster in the bird population.

easily transmittable between humans. So far at least the birds in the US have not become infected. If they do they spread it to humans with very close contact, by living with them for example. Cats can catch it, but since the infection hasn't even spread to the birds here yet that shouldn't be an immediate worry.

The real concern is not so much that the virus will mutate into an efficient human transmissible form-- although that is aways a possiblity. Viral recombination with other human viruses is FAR more likely to yield a human pandemic strain, however. That's the real worry.

Please let all the fundies know this so they can boycott these companies.

Conservatives interested in "protecting marriage" should therefore refuse to use anti-viral medications or flu vaccines. Otherwise, they are "supporting the homosexual agenda" by selfishly protecting themselves from the flu at the expense of "preserving family values."

Tell them to put their money where their mouth is.

In the United States, influenza infections over the past 10 years have resulted in an average of 36,000 deaths and 114,000 hospitalizations each year, and the WHO estimates that the annual average number of deaths worldwide is approximately 500,000.

Why doesn't anyone ever mention this? The human form appears to be be killing on average about 100 people every day just in America, yet no one is warning us to worry about a future pandemic from that. That is what confuses me. Seems like that is the flu we should be concentrating on.

Don

The avian flu will make the standard influenza viruses look like the hiccups, it is as lethal as some strains of Ebola. It is more lethal than small pox. There is no modern killer with the lethal potential this germ carries.

there's that outbreak of Marburg going on in Africa right now that doesn't appear to be contained, and no one's figured out yet why so many of the victims are young children. That gives me lots of warm fuzzies. :scared:

(Marburg is another hemorrhagic nasty, just as lethal as Ebola.)

the ordinary flu just this season. Not enough vaccine. Don't get the vaccine unless you are over 65, as opposed to the usual 50, etc.

That is how much we concentrate on public health. Everytime people complain about 9/11 and the number of dead, and how we must protect ourselves from "terra", I wonder why a disease that annually kills far more than 10 times the number who died 9/11, is almost totally ignored, and there is no mention that we need to increase spending re the flu.

Especially these (from linked article). We need to reverse the trend of "outsourcing" vaccine production - its a national health and security risk.

5. Create financial incentives. Most pharmaceutical companies have left the vaccine business because demand is extremely unpredictable. Even this season, after starting out with a shortage, millions of doses of flu vaccine will likely be thrown away. To secure vaccine supplies for the future, the government needs to guarantee it will buy a set amount of vaccine each season, and buy back a percentage of unsold vaccine at the end of the season.

Also, the United States does not have the manufacturing capacity to produce enough vaccine and antivirals to meet its needs in a pandemic. Tax credits should be offered to encourage companies to build new manufacturing facilities in this country so that the United States is not dependent on foreign suppliers. Tax incentives and patent extensions should be available for companies that research and develop new anti-flu therapies.

when God will rapture the true believers so they won't suffer this horrible fate.

The rest can burn in hell.