H1N1 A: Swine Flu hits 100.000 Americans and 250.000 people worldwide
The news are worse than any simulation had predicted: "Swine flu is spreading more widely than official figures indicate, with outbreaks in Europe and Asia showing it's gained a foothold in at least 3 regions", writes Promed, and: "One in 20 cases is being officially reported in the US, meaning more than 100 000 people have probably been infected nationwide with the new H1N1 flu strain, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)."
Given this factor a total of 250.000 people worldwide could have aquired the new influenza strain. Computational quantitative projections for H1N1 flu dynamics in the United States indicated the projected number of cases in the United States could reach 4000 on May 21th. This was said to be the worst case scenario.
WHO Starts Russian Roulette Vaccine Gamble
The decision is like Russian Roulette: You may be lucky and win - or lose your life. "When World Health Organization [WHO] officials ask vaccine manufacturers to start producing vaccine to fight swine flu in a few
weeks, they will be taking a calculated risk", writes ProMED, and: "Flu vaccine companies can only make one vaccine at a time: either seasonal flu vaccine or
pandemic vaccine". The real problem for manufacturers is simple: Production takes months and it is impossible to switch halfway through if health officials make a mistake. But not every country will lose the game - while some countries like the United States may be better prepared than others American officials say production for next year's vaccine batch is so advanced they're nearly finished, "whereas the situation for many other countries is unknown", as ProMED is explaining.
70 percent of the world's flu vaccines are made in Europe, and the WHO is trying to figure out how many doses of seasonal flu vaccine remain worldwide before asking vaccine manufacturers to start pumping out pandemic vaccine instead. "It's a big decision...We've
never done this before," said Marie-Paule Kieny, director of the WHO's Initiative for Vaccine Research. Kieny said the decision would be like guessing which vaccine the world will need most, but that the WHO would try to hedge its bets by tallying existing seasonal flu vaccine stocks. "We are gambling whether or not we will have enough seasonal vaccine, but it will not be an 'either-or' situation," she
said.
Vaccine makers can make limited amounts of both seasonal flu vaccine and pandemic vaccine though not at the same time but they cannot make massive quantities of both because that exceeds capacity. The impending decision to make pandemic vaccine will also complicate
matters for countries in the southern hemisphere, where the flu season is just starting. The WHO usually makes recommendations about which seasonal flu strains should go into next year's southern hemisphere flu vaccine in September. But if vaccine manufacturers are
already making pandemic vaccine in the fall, that will mean fewer doses of flu vaccine for people in the southern hemisphere.
Regular flu kills between 250000 to 500000 people worldwide every year. Even if the expected influenza pandemic did not start yet, there is no doubt about the comeback of the lethal virus: The first Pandemic Influenza occurred in three waves in the United States - exactly 90 years ago, between 1918 and 1919.
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(2009-05-27)
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