Rob:  Well it’s now been two weeks since the first deaths were reported in Mexico City from a flu that has now spread around the world.  Amid warnings from the World Health Organization, schools and businesses in areas affected have closed in an effort to stem a worldwide pandemic.  Today, we examine several issues surrounding what’s being called the swine flu, and we begin with some background.
Rob:  It’s the catastrophe that all other pandemics are judged by.  As American soldiers returned from World War I, young people began to get sick.  Within six months, more than half-a-million people had died in the U S alone.  And before it ended, what was called the Spanish flu had claimed 50 million victims worldwide.  Over the decades other flues have occurred, each taking their own toll.  In the 1950s the Asian flu killed nearly 70 thousand in the U S.  A decade later, the Hong Kong flu took 33 thousand lives in this country.  In the 1970s the Russian flu sickened many children, but did not cause the fatalities its predecessors had.
Rob:  In the late 1990s, a new threat emerged from Asia.  Unlike its predecessors, Avian flu was able to jump from poultry to man.  Subsequently, thousands of birds were slaughtered across the Far East.  And millions of dollars were spent in this country tracking migratory bird patterns, fearful the disease could gain a foothold in the U S; that never materialized; yet the threat we face today is quite similar, a new strand of flu, that scientists have yet to develop a vaccine for; Kristi Bradley is Oklahoma’s state epidemiologist.
Kristi Bradley:  With influenza, the most significant tool in our tool kit is an effective vaccine.  That’s the way we traditionally deal with seasonal influenza, and it also would be the way we would be able to contain a pandemic influenza strain.  But influenza vaccines have to be very closely matched to the circulating virus, and until we know exactly what that pandemic influenza strain looks like, we cannot begin development of a vaccine.
Rob:  According to Bradley, it could take the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 4-to-6 months after the virus has been identified to produce enough vaccines to distribute throughout the US, so for now, leaving containment as our only option.
Bradley:  It involves a lot of business continuity, looking at ways of handling large numbers of ill people, addressing the problems, a lot of businesses and schools would be faced with absenteeism.  What we perhaps would need to do to create more social distancing in the time that influenza virus could be spreading, meaning that some public events may need to be canceled or postponed.  So there is just really a variety of different efforts that are ongoing there.
Rob:  And if contracted, there are new antiviral drugs, like Tamiflu, that dramatically lessen the flu symptoms.