2009 Swine Flu Epidemic in USA

2009 Swine Flu Epidemic in USA - A Public Health Emergency

Worried over the Swine Flue Epidemic here in the USA and what it means to you and your community? Prevention here is the key and the more you learn about your role, the easier it will be to avoid this latest health threat.

For every day prevention wash your hands regularly. If you feel you are at risk, cover your mouth when coughing, avoid crowds and keep your distance (at least six feet) from others. Tamiflu is the drug of choice to fight this pandemic as it is easily taken as a tablet. Already drug manufacturers are ready with stockpiles in case it is needed.

Here is the latest information from government officials in a press briefing posted by Forbes On-line Sunday, April 26th. www.forbes.com
given by Dr. Richard Bessar, acting director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Secretary Napolitano, Department of Homeland Security who answers directly to President Obama.

For a complete reading of the press breifing go to:

http://www.forbes.com/2009/04/26/swine-flu-disease-business-washington-full-text.html

Bressar: Thank you, Mr. Brennan. First, I want to say that our hearts go out to the people in Mexico and the people in the United States who've been impacted by this outbreak. People around the country and around the globe are concerned with this situation we're seeing, and we're concerned as well. As we look for cases of swine flu, we are seeing more cases of swine flu. We expect to see more cases of swine flu. We're responding and we're responding aggressively to try and learn about this outbreak and to implement measures to control this outbreak.

Today we can confirm that there are 20 cases of swine flu in the United States. We have five affected states: There are eight cases confirmed in New York City, there's one case confirmed in Ohio, two in Kansas, two in Texas, and seven in California.

And again, as we continue to look for cases, I expect that we're going to find them. We've ramped up our surveillance around the country to try and understand better what is the scope, what is the magnitude of this outbreak.

The good news--all of the individuals in this country who have been identified as cases have recovered. Only one individual had to be hospitalized. But I expect as we continue to look for cases, we are going to see a broader spectrum of disease. What we know about this virus is it looks to be the same virus as is causing the situation in Mexico. And given the reports out of Mexico, I would expect that over time we're going to see more severe disease in this country.

There are some things that it's important people understand: Flu viruses are extremely unpredictable and variable; outbreaks of infectious disease are extremely unpredictable and variable. And so over time what we say about this and what we learn will change. Expect changes in terms of the number of cases. We're going to try and give you consistent information and have it on our web site once a day, so that we don't get into the situation where you're hearing different numbers of cases throughout the day--we're going to report that daily.

Because of this speed in which things are progressing, you will at find--at times find inconsistent information, and we're going to work really hard to make sure that that doesn't stay up for long. But as we're updating recommendations and they're going out through various sources, you may find some inconsistency and we will work to minimize that....

It's important that people understand that there's a role for everyone to play when there's an outbreak going on. There are things that individuals do, there's things that families do, communities do to try and reduce the impact. At the individual level, it's important people understand how they can prevent respiratory infections.

**Very frequent hand-washing is something that we talk about time and time again and that is an effective way to reduce transmission of disease. If you're sick, it's very important that people stay at home. If your children are sick, have a fever and flu-like illness, they shouldn't go to school. And if you're ill, you shouldn't get on an airplane or another public transport to travel. Those things are part of personal responsibility in trying to reduce the impact.

It's important that people think about what they would do if this outbreak ramps up in their community. We understand that in New York City there's a cluster of disease in a school and New York City has announced that they're not having those children come back to school on Monday, so that they can understand better about transmission in that school. There's a similar situation in Texas.

There are a number of sources of information. I want people to know that the CDC web site--www.cdc.gov--has our latest information on swine flu. There's a link from there to very current information and there's a link there to a Spanish language site as well.

We're also doing a lot of work with the World Health Organization, the Pan American Health Organization, and the governments of Mexico and Canada on this outbreak. There's a tri-national team that is working in Mexico to try and understand better the spread--why are they seeing more severe disease in Mexico than we are here? That's a critical question. We're working to assist Mexico in establishing more laboratory capacity in-country. That, again, is very important because when you can define someone as a truly confirmed case, what you understand about how they acquire disease takes on much more meaning.

We issued two days ago an outbreak notice on our web site regarding travel to Mexico. It indicated that if you are traveling to Mexico, that you look at that to see what precautions could you take as an individual to reduce the likelihood that you became ill. We're going to continue to evaluate the situation in Mexico, and if need be we will increase the warnings based on what the situation warrants.

And I think that the last thing I want to mention is that whenever we see a novel strain of influenza, we begin our work in the event that a vaccine needs to be manufactured. So we've created that seed stock, we've identified that virus, and discussions are underway so that should we decide to work on manufacturing a vaccine, we can work towards that goal very quickly.

So thank you very much, and I'll turn it over to the Secretary.

Napolitano: Thanks, Dr. Besser. A number of things going on and the purpose of today, this briefing, is to give you the most current information about what is happening. And as has been mentioned before, this is a changing picture. And so we intend to conduct these types of briefings daily for a while so that, you know, it can help up communicate to the public what is happening and so that with knowledge people know what kind of issue we're dealing with.

The first thing I want to announce today is that the Department of Health and Human Services will declare today a public health emergency in the United States. That sounds more severe than really it is.

This is standard operating procedure and allows us to free up federal, state, and local agencies and their resources for prevention and mitigation; it allows us to use medication and diagnostic tests that we might not otherwise be able to use, particularly on very young children; and it releases funds for the acquisition of additional antivirals.

Second, I want to give you some information about where we are with respect to antiviral drugs. These are the kinds of things you would take should you get sick with this strain of flu.

We have 50 million treatment courses of antiviral drugs--Tamiflu and Relenza--in the strategic national stockpile. We are releasing 25 percent of those courses, making them available to all of the states, but particularly prioritizing the states where we already have confirmed incidents of the flu. In addition, the Department of Defense has procured and strategically prepositioned 7 million treatment courses of Tamiflu.

Next, in the Department of Homeland Security, we have a number of components with direct responsibility here. The CBP is inventorying for every duty station and every employee our resources, personal protective equipment, and so forth, to make sure that we have adequate supplies on hand at the borders themselves.

Secondly, we have implemented passive surveillance protocols to screen individuals who may arrive at our borders. All persons entering the United States from a location of human infection of swine flu will be processed through all appropriate CBP protocols. Right now those are passive. That means that they're looking for people who--and asking about, are you sick, have you been sick, and the like; and if so, then they can be referred over for further examination.

Travelers who do present with symptoms, if and when encountered, will be isolated per established rules. They will be provided both with personal protective equipment and we will continue to emphasize universal health measures like hand-washing and gloves. And if and when the situation develops all CBP sites can implement and we can deploy additional personnel to the borders.

In addition, at the TSA, many of the similar measures are being implemented there with respect to the protection of our TSA workers and also their experience with travelers. To date, the State Department has not issued official travel advisories for particularly Mexico, but again, as I said earlier, these situations are very fluid and so you need to keep up to date on that. In addition to the CDC website, the Department of State has a website that will keep travelers posted on what the situation is not only with our neighboring countries, but with countries around the world.

As I said earlier, our intent is to update you daily on this situation so that you can know what is happening within the federal government. State and local governments obviously now are in the loop. State and local public health authorities obviously are working very hard and will be working hard, because as the doctor said, this will be a marathon, not a sprint, and even if this outbreak is a small one, we can anticipate that we may have a subsequent or follow-on outbreak several months later, which we will be prepared for.

And again, the government can't solve this alone. We need everybody in the United States to take some responsibility here. If you are sick, stay home. Wash your hands, take all of those reasonable measures; that will help us mitigate, contain how many people actually get sick in our country.
For a complete reading of the press breifing go to:

http://www.forbes.com/2009/04/26/swine-flu-disease-business-washington-full-text.html