Posted on 08/27/2009 8:05:25 PM PDT by Brugmansian
THE swine flu epidemic almost brought the NSW hospital system to its knees, wiping out 5000 surgical procedures, taking up a third of intensive care beds and forcing up sick leave among hospital staff by more than 50 per cent.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailytelegraph.com.au ...
Fight for swine flu vaccine could get ugly
The Associated Press
By MARIA CHENG
7/16/09
LONDON — An ugly scramble is brewing over the swine flu vaccine — and when it becomes available, Britain, the United States and other nations could find that the contracts they signed with pharmaceutical companies are easily broken.
Experts warn that during a global epidemic, which the world is in now, governments may be under tremendous pressure to protect their own citizens first before allowing companies to ship doses of vaccine out of the country.
That does not bode well for many countries, including the United States, which makes only 20 percent of the flu vaccines it uses, or Britain, where all of its flu vaccines are produced abroad.
“This isn’t rocket science,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. “If there is severe disease, countries will want to hang onto the vaccine for their own citizens.”
Experts say politicians would not be able to withstand the pressure.
“The consequences of shipping vaccine to another country when your own people don’t have it would be devastating,” added David Fedson, a retired vaccine industry executive.
About 70 percent of the world’s flu vaccines are made in Europe, and only a handful of countries are self-sufficient in vaccines. The U.S. has limited flu vaccine facilities, and because factories can’t be built overnight, there is no quick fix to boost vaccine supplies.
Last week, the World Health Organization reported nearly 95,000 cases of swine flu including 429 deaths worldwide. If swine flu turns deadlier in the winter, the main flu season in the Northern Hemisphere, countries will likely be clamoring for any available vaccines.
“Pandemic vaccine will be a valuable and scarce resource, like oil or food during a famine,” said David Fidler, a professor of law at Indiana University who has consulted for WHO. “We’ve seen how countries behave in those situations, and it’s not encouraging.”
Britain claims it will start vaccinating people in August, Italy says it will begin by the end of the year, and many other countries have similar strategies. Those mass vaccination plans could be derailed by problems making the vaccine and by other countries’ refusal to ship it abroad.
If the virus remains mild, this could all be moot. Experts estimate swine flu to be about as dangerous as seasonal flu, and there usually isn’t a high demand for those vaccines. Still, regular flu kills up to 500,000 people a year.
In past pandemics, or global epidemics, vaccines were never exported before the country that produced them got enough for its own population first.
Unlike the last two pandemics in 1957 and 1968, however, many more countries this time around have struck deals with companies which they say guarantees them first access to vaccine. Yet in a global health emergency, those contracts may ultimately be meaningless.
Countries with flu vaccine plants might decide to seize all vaccines and ban their export, thus breaking the pharmaceutical contracts promising other countries vaccine supplies. These private contracts are not binding international law between two countries, according to Fidler.
He said most vaccine contracts include a clause allowing them to be broken under extraordinary circumstances, such as a health emergency. That would leave the countries who had brokered such deals not only without vaccine, but without legal recourse.
“There’s nothing in international law that helps you resolve this, it’s just a political nightmare happening in the midst of an epidemiological nightmare,” Fidler said.
Britain has ordered 60 million doses, enough to cover its entire population. But those doses are being manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline PLC and Baxter International Inc., whose production plants are in Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. Neither Britain’s department of health or the vaccine manufacturers would comment on delivery plans.
Osterholm said about 80 percent of the United States’ pandemic vaccine supply will be coming from abroad and he is very concerned about when it might arrive. Timing could be everything to avoid a vaccine spat.
“It’s easy to move vaccine around if the disease is relatively mild. But if it is more severe, countries may not be willing to let it go,” he said.
So far, swine flu remains a relatively mild disease, and most people don’t need medical treatment to get better. But experts fear the virus could mutate into a more dangerous form. And during the flu season, when the virus spreads more easily, more people will probably fall sick and die.
Public health officials are aware that so-called “vaccine wars” might break out if the swine flu outbreak worsens, but are loathe to even discuss the topic.
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, an agency of the European Union, said it had no mandate to advise countries in such circumstances. WHO said it was not aware of any countries planning to block the shipment of vaccines and said they would work to ensure all countries get enough doses to protect their health workers.
Questions also remain about when a swine flu vaccine will even be available, as WHO reported this week that a fully licensed vaccine might not be ready until the end of the year.
With little or no safety data about a swine flu vaccine, governments that are planning to roll out mass campaigns are taking a gamble, since any rare side effects won’t show up until millions of people start getting the shots.
Experts say government promises about when vaccines will arrive should be taken with a huge grain of salt.
“Many pieces of the puzzle are missing,” Osterholm said. “Anyone who pretends to have a well-defined schedule of vaccine delivery is obviously very poorly informed.”
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i7gN7uEKsp5QNVnXNLF0JCVT6FOAD99FJ6003
Swine flu vaccine access biased in “favor of affluence:” WHO Chief
www.chinaview.cn 2009-07-15 17:06:19
BEIJING, July 15 (Xinhuanet) — Poverty will stop some countries gain access to swine flu vaccines, said the head of World Health Organization.
WHO chief Margeret Chan said Tuesday: “manufacturing capacity for influenza vaccines is finite and woefully inadequate for a world of 6.8 billion people, nearly all of whom are susceptible to infection by this entirely new and highly contagious virus.”
“The lion’s share of these limited supplies will go to wealthy countries. Again we see the advantage of affluence. Again we see access denied by an inability to pay,” she told delegates attending a World Intellectual Property Organization conference.
Access to life-saving interventions such as antiviral is “biased in favor of affluence.” The discovery of H1N1 infections that resist the antiviral Tamiflu and the global scramble for pandemic vaccine shows the importance of innovation in keeping pace with the emergence of new diseases, Chan said.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-07/15/content_11713904.htm
It's winter in the Southern Hemisphere.
I still maintain unless there is a nasty mutation not much is going to come of it other then hype by governmental officials.
My belief is they are covering their ass in case on the rare chance it does mutate.
That’s why I gave you a little sampling of the “news” that is out there about it... :-) The news speaks for itself and everyone can draw their own conclusions from the news that is being reported about what is happening and has been happening...
if you seen any signs of change please point it out and I will do the same for you.
thanks
The only thing I need to point to is that it’s the first flu pandemic in 47 years (since the Hong Kong Flu in 1968...) and that’s enough to get my attention... :-)
Hong Kong flu
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong_flu
Plus the fact that Australia is getting hammered really bad... (see some articles posted about that, too...).
“We report—you decide.”
;)
***I heard today that “swine flu” shots will be for folks between 15-35 years of age. I’m worried about my parents (in their 80’s).***
There is a reason for this. When the old die the US does not have to pay them Social Security! the more that die off means less to pay!
I’m also amongst the ones left out in the cold!
Sarc/off
It’s always humorous to see FReepers arguing both side of the argument — against the government — at the same time... LOL...
I mean... there’s no way the government came “win” with FReepers... :-) There are FReepers who say if you *don’t* get the vaccine, it’s because the government wants to kill you.
And then there are FReepers who say that if you *do* get the vaccine, it’s because the government wants to kill you...
You see... we’ve got *both sides* of this argument covered... LOL...
I don’t have a strong opinion yet about this. I am certain that the fire department I work for will be providing flu shots soon. I get one every year because we are exposed frequently to sick people and I don’t want to contribute to the spread of the flu.
I am a little baffled by the increased attention to the flu this year. Flu viruses kill approximately 20,000 to 40,000 Americans every year and 250,000 to 500,000 people worldwide. So far this flu has supposedly killed around 1,200 people. It does seem like we have seen a few more patients with flu symptoms than normal for the summer months, but no patients with life threatening symptoms.
Posting multiple news reports that all basically are saying the same thing doesn’t make a convincing argument in my book. Given the left’s propensity for hyping crisis situations for political gain causes me to strongly suspect that the increased attention on the flu has something to do with the current health care debate. I could be wrong, but I am not losing any sleep over it. I will be on the front lines in a few months if this thing does somehow get out of control.
pregnancy affects the immune system
Yup. About 5 thousand “if”, “might”, or “could’s” you just posted here.
CDC has to plan for “worst case”, but they also say “not likely” with this flu, no?
Follow the money.
Where I’m at, it’s been an unusually cool, wet summer. Does that = more summer flu cases?
I think that if you look at the entirety of what CDC is saying, they seem to be pretty sensible about it.
You said — Follow the money.
—
The A/H1N1 flu virus works for free... :-)
You said — Posting multiple news reports that all basically are saying the same thing doesn’t make a convincing argument in my book.
—
It does one thing... shows different sources for the same basic consistent information... :-)
> How’s things going on your island next door to Oz?
By “Oz” do you mean that large lump of land to the West of us that we call “West Island”?
Things in New Zealand are pretty good. Our new conservative government is settling in well and is making some useful changes. The weather is turning to Spring, which is also nice, after a long and chilly winter.
> Odd that Australia was smacked so hard, while the USA barely could tell the difference.
With the Swine Flu?
It is unusual that Australia has been hit so hard. Here in New Zealand we have only had a very few cases: we’re lucky because open ocean makes an excellent biosecurity fence, putting our Nation almost automatically into quarantine whenever one of these major diseases crops up.
Australia, too, has similar protection — lots of open ocean — so it is doubly odd that they have been hit so hard. I’m not sure why that is.
Google swine flu and cytokine storm and you’ll find lots of articles.
I found a brief synopsis in the wikipedia article:
It is believed that cytokine storms were responsible for many of the deaths during the 1918 influenza pandemic, which killed a disproportionate number of young adults.[1] In this case, a healthy immune system may have been a liability rather than an asset. Preliminary research results from Hong Kong also indicated this as the probable reason for many deaths during the SARS epidemic in 2003.[6] Human deaths from the bird flu H5N1 usually involve cytokine storms as well.[7] Recent reports of high mortality among healthy young adults in the 2009 swine flu outbreak has led to speculation that cytokine storms could be responsible for these deaths.[8]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm
“I heard awhile back that older folks (that’s me) probably have been exposed to it some time in their life and carry anti bodies. Or it could be Oh’bozo practicing “culling the herd”
We old goats probably have not been exposed to this version h1n1.
The word from the CDC is supposedly younger people (preschool, school and college age) will be the group hit the heaviest by the h1n1.
The Air Force Academy was recently hit with over 100 cases. The female AF doc did what the military has done before with infectious diseases. The documented cases and those exposed were isolated and kept in isolation until the H1N1 had ran its course.
When I was in Navy Boot at Great Lakes, we had two meningitis cases. Our barracks floor and the one below were kept in strict isolation with very serious and armed Marine Guards. One boot died and the other recovered. The rest of us received sulfa drugs as prophy, and there were no more cases. It was not a fun time.
People our age supposedly aren’t in danger from h1n1.
Make sure your pneumonia shots are up todate and get the flu shot for the regular fall/winter/spring flu..
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