Thinking Ahead

The Times has obtained a draft of The Administration's plan of dealing with the avian bird flu epidemic in America. It outlines measures needed which are far beyond the capacity of America currently to stem the disease if it mutates into a viable candidate for devastation:

A draft of the Bush administration's final plan for dealing with a likely Pandemic flu outbreak shows the United States is woefully unprepared for the potential disaster, The New York Times reported on Saturday.

The document says a large outbreak that began in Asia would be likely to reach the United States within "a few months or even weeks," and that more than 1.9 million people could die in the worst case scenario, the Times said.

If that occurred, according to the draft, hospitals would be overwhelmed, riots would engulf vaccination clinics and power and food would be in short supply, it said.

...
The nearly 400-page plan calls for quarantine and travel restrictions, but notes that those moves are unlikely to slow "introduction of pandemic disease into the U.S. by more than a month or two," the Times said.

The draft, written by health officials, includes 10 supplements that suggest ways for local and state governments to prepare, such as drafting documents that would justify quarantine. It does not address military or other government departmental responses, the Times reported.

According to the document, in the worst-case scenario 8.5 million would also be hospitalized, and costs would exceed $450 billion. It calls for production of 600 million vaccines within six months, which is more than 10 times current capacity.

U.S. President George W. Bush met with the chief executive officers of some of the top corporate makers of vaccines on Friday and asked them to do their utmost to boost flu vaccine production.

The Times quoted an unnamed health official who provided the copy of the plan as saying its true shortcoming was "that is doesn't say who's in charge."

Envisioning how an outbreak might play out at its peak, the draft says about a quarter of workers stay home because they are sick or afraid of becoming sick. Hospitals are overwhelmed, it says.

"Social unrest occurs," the plan says. "Public anxiety heightens mistrust of government, diminishing compliance with public health advisories. Mortuaries and funeral homes are overwhelmed."

This is the worst-case scenario of any wide-spread disease. It shows how supple we are to natural forces- how our government and our society can't protect us from the sea, the land, the sky, and our own inner worlds of biology. A scary proposition.

America's capacity is limited- the question of vaccination production is dubious at best: timing is crucial. Too early, and the vaccines may be ineffective against a strain which has already mutated again, or they may be lost to spoilage. And yet, America seems "woefully" behind- a vaccination is at least something. As with most devastation, the disease will rip through poorer, working populations first and fasted: the people who have no health insurance and have no economic choice to stay home will be the conduit of this germ- the reliably hardest hit, the reliably neglected of America. It is in our interest to produce free vaccinations for every American if it is even possible to make that claim; but the extant vaccinations must also be dealt responsibly.

-----
Anybody have any polls, links, etc for the AntiC to link to re: avian flu...?