Bird Flu (Avian Influenza)
Documents & Texts from America.gov
1 January 2006
Flu Pandemic Preparations Needed Now, U.S. Health Officials Say
By Melody Merin
Washington File Special Correspondent
Washington -- Although the H5N1 strain of avian influenza -- or bird flu -- that has resulted in the deaths of 74 people in Asia and millions of birds throughout Asia and parts of Europe has not yet demonstrated the ability to spread easily among humans, the international community must take steps now to prepare for a possible pandemic, Bush administration officials said on two talk shows January 1. “The virus continues to spread in wild birds across the world. There is no reason to believe that at some point it will stop. ... We need to be prepared,” Michael Leavitt, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, said on CNN's Late Edition. "Viruses know not sovereignty. They understand no political boundary. They travel by the rules and laws of nature and there are many of them and they are continually changing and working their way toward ways to adapt so that they can inhabit human hosts and other living things," he continued. Dr. Julie Gerberding of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) echoed Leavitt's sentiments on CBS’s Face the Nation. “We've probably never been closer to a pandemic," she said. "[W]hen we see the ominous signs of this very bad virus continuing to propagate [in Asia and Europe], we do need to take it seriously and solve some of the problems that would be in our way for an effective response in the United States." Gerberding noted that the world has experienced three flu pandemics in the last 100 years, "and there's certainly every reason to suspect that it will happen again." "And that's why, whether we're preparing for H5N1, or some future pandemic, the steps we're taking now really will save lives and will really help us do more to protect people in the future," she said. NECESSARY TOOLS Leavitt and Gerberding emphasized the importance of establishing a reliable vaccine supply system, of developing more and better anti-viral drugs to prevent a flu outbreak and of strengthening the U.S. health care system at every level. "We've got to get a vaccine supply that we can count on. We've got to get more and better anti-viral drugs. And we've got to have every single link in our public health system as strong as it can be so we can detect this problem and do the things at the local community level that we need to do to save lives," Gerberding said. Gerberding identified vaccine production and modernization as well as the U.S. health system’s capability to withstand a surge in care requirements to be the biggest challenges facing the United States in the event of a flu pandemic. When asked about the World Health Organization's suggestion to impose quarantines at the first sign of a pandemic, Gerberding said the United States -- with support from the international community -- would isolate flu victims and their immediate contacts but would be unlikely to impose "draconian measures" such as using military forces "to really completely quarantine a community or even quarantine a country." Countries that have reported cases of bird flu include Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Turkey, Croatia, Romania and Greece. Human illnesses and deaths from bird flu have occurred in China, Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. In all but one case, the path of infection from sick birds to humans has been readily identified, with poultry workers, farmers, people who have slaughtered chickens and children who have been playing in yards with infected chickens among the most frequently reported cases. For additional information on U.S. policy and efforts to combat the disease, see Bird Flu (Avian Influenza). The transcript of Leavitt's remarks is available on the CNN Web site. More information on bird flu is available on the CDC Web site.
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(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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