MINISTER FOR Health Mary Harney said last evening that she was satisfied the health service is prepared to deal with H1N1 swine flu, which the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared the first flu pandemic in its member countries for 40 years.
The WHO yesterday raised its pandemic flu alert to phase six on a six point scale because of growing human to human transmission of the virus, which was “not stoppable” but has proved mainly mild. An influenza pandemic is a worldwide epidemic of a disease that may occur when a new virus appears, against which the human population has no immunity, according to the WHO.
The H1N1 strain has spread widely after emerging in April in Mexico and the US. There have been 28,774 cases reported in 74 countries resulting in 144 deaths. The number of undetected cases is is likely to run into hundreds of thousands. A total of 12 cases have been diagnosed in Ireland, largely in people who had traveled from the US. All are recovering well.
At a press conference at Government Buildings yesterday evening, Ms Harney said her department was “satisfied that in Ireland we are completely prepared” to handle the virus.
Dr Tony Holohan, chief medical officer at the Department of Health, said it had long been predicted that the WHO would declare the virus a level six pandemic. He said the number of cases identified here would dictate the response of the health service.
Dr Holohan said that in the national pandemic plan there are four levels, and that it is now at level two, meaning there are a small number of sporadic cases.
He said the WHO had provided “specific guidance” on the arrangements that need to be put in place and that the National Pandemic Plan had been updated in areas such as monitoring, response levels in the health service and communication with the public and health professionals.
“National pandemic plans in recent years have been written very much with H5N1 Avian Flu in mind and as you know Avian Flu in humans tends to be more severe and is associated with more significant mortality and morbidity than what we are currently seeing with H1N1,” he said. He added that there was no need to place restrictions on travel.
Prof Bill Hall, chairman of the National Pandemic Influenza Group, said the H1N1 strain was “very clearly a mild respiratory disease” that was similar if not milder than seasonal influenza.
Prof Hall said complications with the virus were largely occurring in individuals who had “underlying conditions” such as heart disease or lung disease.
Dr Kevin Kelleher, head of health protection with the Health Service Executive (HSE), said the HSE now had enough anti-virals to treat 50 per cent of the population and that it has also secured access to a vaccine based on the virus. This would be used to ensure the protection of those most at risk and frontline health professionals.
The decision to increase the alert to phase six was based on an assessment that the virus is spreading in a sustained way in the eight most heavily-hit countries – Australia, Britain, Canada, Chile, Japan, Mexico, Spain and the US.
“This is a very important and challenging day for all of us. It is important because we will be raising our pandemic alert level to level 6,” said WHO director-general Dr Margaret Chan.
“Moving to pandemic phase six level does not imply we will see an increase in the number of deaths or very severe cases.”
The WHO also recommended drugmakers complete production of vaccines for seasonal influenza, which kills some 500,000 each year, for next winter as a premature switch in production to cope with the new H1N1 strain could put many people at risk. (Additional reporting – Reuters)
