The pandemic flu report

John Bowen of Hometown Security has summarized two reports giving updates on pandemic planning efforts. One is more optimistic than the other, but both reports stress that there much to do.

The first report was written by the Financial Services Roundtable, which represents 100 of the largest integrated financial services companies providing banking, insurance, investment products and services to the American consumer. From the FSR:

• No one is ready if the pandemic occurs within the next several years.
• Not only will it take six months after the outbreak of a pandemic to produce sufficient vaccine, this isn’t scheduled to be possible for another five years.
• There is broad consensus that most local health care systems – hospitals in particular – do not have the excess capacity of beds, equipment, and trained personnel to handle a large influx of patients seeking medical care in a moderate to severe pandemic.

The report also provides recommendations, that are not novel among pandemic planning circles, but probably still unheeded. What caught my eyes are these -

Even with the best of preparations, however, it is an unfortunate fact that many people will die if a pandemic flu breaks out. Agressive proactive policy actions taken now can reduce the extent of human tragedy and economic disruption associated with a pandemic. This report is a clarion call to action.

The second report was provided by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which of course has a more optimistic tone, since, as John Bowen points out, is a report “from a government department that is summarizing its own activities.”

Both publications are worth reading and can be accessed here and here. The rest of John Bowen’s post on “pandemic flu updates” can be found here.

Tags: pandemic flu, bird flu, Disaster Preparedness, flu outbreaks