Obama Washes His Hands of the Flu

September 2, 2009 (LPAC)—President Obama continues to wash his hands of the H1N1/09 pandemic, by repeating what he calls his "common sense" advice to wash your hands, cover your cough, and be "prepared," not "alarmed." He said this again on Tuesday in Washington, D.C. at a high-profile photo-opportunity with several Cabinet members, after they met on preparedness for the Fall flu resurgence in the U.S., which is already underway, especially in the Southeastern states.

What in reality is giving great cause for alarm—as is rightly being loudly expressed at U.S. town meetings—is the outstanding non-leadership in Congress, and the Nazi-medical "reform" push from the White House. The physical logistics don't exist to provide properly for U.S. health care; they are non-existent in large parts of the world; meantime, conditions for more pandemics are developing. Still, the President of the United States keeps babbling about your "personal role" in not-spreading the flu virus.

His Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who is a leading advocate for the Nazi medical "reform," is doling out only paltry funding for state and local health department readiness, let alone for a build-up of international public health defenses. Instead, she is doing such things as initiating a cover-your-cough advertising blitz, devised with the Sesame Street Workshop, featuring Elmo, the TV personality. As far as inoculation, the other HHS principal anti-flu program, there will be no U.S. immunity from inoculation—even if all goes perfectly, and vaccination begins in mid-October—until late November, or even December and January.

Meantime, state and local health officials and physicians are scrambling on their own, for contingency arrangements to deal with the wave of hospitalizations and intensive care requirements that will be needed very soon, based on the profile of this new flu, for preferentially causing a certain number of severe cases among youth, as well as others in a weakened condition.

- Canada -

Dr. Robert Fowler, who teaches critical care medicine at the University of Toronto, gave a summary to the CanWest News Service on the eve of the national physicians meeting in Winnipeg tomorrow, on how best to treat severe flu cases. "Although there are certain people who become critically ill with this virus that have co-morbidities, it has been remarkable for its ability to cause illness in patients that don't have chronic illness and are too weakened from some other medical condition," he said. Fowler said of his co-sponsoring association: "We're calling every hospital in the country to do an inventory of the number of ventilators that exist. Our concern is that our capacity to deliver care will be challenged like it hasn't really been before..."

- Sweden -

In Sweden, there is almost a panic over the question of critical care capacity. Yesterday, a 40-year-old man died in his home in Uppsala after just five days of illness. This is the first death from the new flu virus, and it has triggered a lot of press conferences. In Sweden, 915 cases of H1N1 have been registered. At least 49 of those required hospitalization, and six of those needed intensive care, five of them in extra-corporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) ventilation units. A hospitals' inventory now reports that there are 35 ECMO units in Sweden — maybe a few more, if all heart surgeries are stopped. "If 20-40%, which is 2-4 million Swedes, become infected by H1N1, and 0.4% need ECMO treatment, that makes 8,000-16,000 Swedes, for which 35 units would be worthless," a Swedish doctor pushing for vaccination writes on his website. "In that case, the ECMO treatment would be reserved for extreme cases, such as otherwise healthy children; the rest would die. Even more will need intensive care in ventilators, of which there are also not enough," he writes.

Internationally, the H1N1/09 is continuing its spread on all continents. For example, on the Indian Sub-continent, the first fatality from H1N1/09 flu virus in Bangladesh was reported in Dhaka on August 31. A 37-year-old woman died of the disease after two weeks of hospital treatment. Nearly 200 lab-confirmed cases are reported. In India today, the official death toll rose to 100, with deaths reported in at least eight cities cross county, and an official count of 4,000 cases reported.

- United States Resurgence -

A pick-up in H1N1 activity in the Southeastern states, has Alabama in the forefront. The University of Alabama had 52 cases on opening day, of suspected novel flu, with more since then. Georgia Tech now reports 150. University of Tennessee, 100. Other campus "hot spots" are developing including the University of Kansas, with 200 cases; and a California high school.

This resurgence is inevitable, given that there is a background of flu presence in all 50 states, and with the Fall season of new group activities getting underway, the flu takes off again. In Alabama, where lower-grades of schools opened in mid-August, school districts had outbreaks immediately in Mobile, Tuscaloosa, Tuskegee and elsewhere.

The Southeastern Alabama Medical Center has banned any visitors under the age of 12; their emergency room traffic has spiked 25% since school opened. In Mobile, the main hospitals report a 50-percent increase in emergency room traffic for August.

Alabama is paradigmatic for the United States, in decline in ratios of hospital beds, equipment and staff per population. In 1980, there were 19,100 community hospital beds; this has fallen 17.9% down to 15,700 beds as of 2007.

Whereas under Hill-Burton, Alabama's supply of hospital beds went from 2.6/1,000 residents in 1958, up to 4.9 in 1980; it now has fallen back to 3.4 beds/1,000 as of 2007. Nationwide, the U.S. had barely 2.7 beds/1,000 in 2007, and even less today.

In New York City today, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the metropolitan Fall flu pandemic readiness plan. It involves converting some public health clinics into specialized flu treatment centers, as a contingency for dealing with the H1N1/09 resurgence, given the limitations of the hospital system.

In Greater Washington, D.C., a meeting took place today between Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and the Governors of Virginia and Maryland, and District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty.