breaking news bird flu found in japan, page-13

'woefully underprepared'
June 25, 2005




WASHINGTON -- More than a half-million people could die and more than 2.3 million could be hospitalized if a moderately severe strain of pandemic flu virus hits the United States, a research group said Friday.

The report from the Trust for America's Health assumes that 25 percent of a country's population would become infected if a strain of avian flu became highly contagious and humans had no natural immunity against it. The researchers also assumed the severity of the strain would fall about midway between the pandemics of 1918 and of 1968.

'Woefully underprepared'



The group says the staggering number of potential deaths and hospitalizations would overwhelm the nation's health system.

It's a message some lawmakers quickly embraced. ''Unfortunately, the United States is woefully underprepared to respond in the event of a pandemic outbreak,'' said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.).

Asia's latest bird-flu outbreak began late last year and has killed 38 in Vietnam, 12 in Thailand and four in Cambodia. People killed by the flu so far have contracted it from sick birds. The fear is that the virus will mutate so it can be contracted from humans.

The trust called on lawmakers to provide more than the $58 million they've approved for buying influenza countermeasures for a national stockpile. The group calls for the purchase of more Tamiflu, which it said may be an effective treatment while scientist work on a vaccin