CDC: Smallpox May Still Be a Threat

ABC News ^ | July 16, 2003 | AP

[FairOpinion]

A top federal health official worries that Americans have been "lulled into a false sense of security" about the threat of smallpox, because biological agents have not yet been found in Iraq.

The need to prepare for an attack is just as urgent, Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Wednesday. Federal officials must work hard to explain this to state and local health officials, who have been slow to get vaccinated against smallpox, partly because they do not believe the virus poses a real threat, she added.

"It concerns me very much that people have been lulled into a false sense of security about the smallpox threat," Gerberding said in an interview. "Nothing has changed our estimate about the threat of smallpox."

She added that plans for the vaccination program began last summer and were not tied to Iraq. While a bioterror attack with the virus was not considered likely, she said, "the consequences of an attack were so severe we had to be prepared ... no matter what happened in Iraq."

Officials had aimed to vaccinate hundreds of thousands of hospital and public health workers and then millions of police, fire and other emergency responders by now. But nearly six months into the program, fewer than 40,000 people have received the shots. Over the past month, the program has come to a virtual standstill with fewer than 100 sometimes fewer than 50 people vaccinated each week.

Federal officials had hoped that the creation of a compensation package for people injured by the vaccine, which carries rare but serious risks, would jump start the program, but it has not.

Gerberding said she expects the vaccination numbers to increase after states are given money to help pay for their programs. Earlier this year, states complained that they did not have money to run vaccination clinics, but they will come August.

"This is an accountability issue," Gerberding said. "We have an expectation, and they have a responsibility."

She said that federal health officials are still working to make the smallpox vaccine available to the general public, though it's unlikely to be offered by this summer, as they had originally hoped. She said CDC officials are talking with various contractors who could offer the vaccine nationally, but there is no timetable. It's still possible that the general public will have to wait until the vaccine is licensed, probably next summer.

The vaccine is not recommended for the general public, because officials believe the dangers of the vaccine outweigh the risk of encountering the disease. But President Bush promised to make it available to those who insist on being vaccinated.

"I do get e-mails from people who say they're waiting for their vaccine," Gerberding said, but she added, "There's certainly no large demand for it that I'm aware of it at this point in time."

People can get vaccinated now by signing up for one of several clinical trials that are testing various versions of the smallpox vaccine.

Officials say the delay results partly from the amount of work required in trying to vaccinate the hospital workers and others who would care for patients if there were an attack with the virus.

"We're not going to distract attention away from that to initiate a whole new program," she said.

A combination of events has kept people from getting the vaccine, said Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, a national bioterrorism expert and federal adviser. Among them: perception of a diminished threat, questions about compensation for injuries and unexpected heart problems in some vaccinees.

The program is like an ocean liner, he said.

"It takes a long time to get it moving, and if it hits an abutment it takes a short time to stop it," he said. "Fortunately, it didn't sink. Now we have to start it up again, and that's what's happening."

[FairOpinion]

I agree. It's nice to not have to think about it, but the time to think about it and do something about it is before it becomes and emergency. Especially when there is a vaccine against it.

[Support Free Republic]

SHOW ME THE MONEY !!!

[FairOpinion]

There is also an article in the Washington Post about it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2647-2003Jul16.html

Focus on Smallpox Threat Revived
Experts Say Immunization Program Is Crucial to Homeland Security

In a series of interviews and published articles, Pentagon officials, conservative thinkers and a few public health officials argue that without a sizable network of inoculated health care workers, the United States remains ill-equipped to respond to a smallpox attack. And, they contend, anxiety about the dangerous side effects of the vaccine should be quelled by the success of the military in immunizing nearly a half-million personnel with few serious complications.

"We know that the former Soviet Union had large quantities of weaponized smallpox or smallpox that could be used in an offensive manner," Winkenwerder said. "All of those stores are not accounted for, to our knowledge."

The CDC calculated last year that it would take 1.25 million immunized health workers to run enough emergency clinics to immunize the U.S. population within 10 days in the event of an attack. Yale University professor Edward Kaplan said he has seen no evidence the country is near that capability.

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10 days is way too long to immunize people. Thousands of people could die.

[ccmay]

Smallpox May Still Be a Threat

No it's not. We have enough vaccine to protect the whole country now.

It would certainly be an unmitigated disaster for the Third World, however. I can't imagine any terrorist being fool enough to deploy it and destroy his own country while leaving the Great Satan virtually untouched.

-ccm

[ccmay]

it would take 1.25 million immunized health workers to run enough emergency clinics to immunize the U.S. population within 10 days in the event of an attack.

Pooh. Any high school kid can be taught in ten minutes how to administer the vaccine. And if even one confirmed case of smallpox were to break out anywhere in the world, practically every health care worker in the country would get vaccinated the very same day.

This is scaremongering by journalists wishing to sell newspapers, in cahoots with bureaucrats eager to build their empires and bloat their budgets. Much like global warming.

Don't panic. Smallpox is finished as a means of damaging the USA.

-ccm

[FairOpinion]

Vaccines on the shelf are about as useful as an unloaded gun, when a criminal breaks into the house.

The ring vaccinations work in natural outbreaks, when it starts with one or a very few people, but not in a potential terrorist attack, when terrorists could infect thousands in various cities, before people realize what they are facing.

CDC was not notified about the monkeypox outbreak, which is actually very similar in appearance to smallpox.

Multiple outbreaks, slow response, not to mention panic and so on would result in thousands of unnecessary deaths, which could be prevented by vaccinating most people.

[jetson]

I think the CDC and US government are blowing smoke up everyones rear ends. What good are vacines when we already know black plague and the variola virus have been geneticaly altered for new bio weapons. Which vacine are they going to give. I think this whole push in the middle east is to find where the new altered stockpiles are being hidden. If there is no real threat then why do they keep all of this stuff in level 4 bio containment bunkers.

[backhoe]

Nuclear, Biological, & Chemical Warfare- Survival Skills, Pt. II

[Caipirabob]

You said it.

With all the manipulation during the refinement and weaponization of the virus, it's basically an entirely new threat and more than likely a vaccine developed for a naturally occuring variant won't work.

[jetson]

Good ponit!