Northern Hemisphere "New Flu" Peak Could Be In 6 to 8 Weeks; Sebelius Prescribes Obamacare

September 16, 2009 (LPAC)—After extending to all 50 states over the Summer, the H1N1/09 flu took off when schools started up in mid-August in several Southeast states, and when colleges convened. There are no new, authoritative statistics, but the number of cases is growing rapidly since the U.S. racked up an estimated one million cases as of mid-Summer. So far, there have been an estimated 9,000 hospitalizations, and 600 deaths.

Mexico is in a similar situation; Canada is on the same trajectory. An upsurge of the H1N1/09 in at least seven Mexican states has forced school closings, including 1,400 in Sinaloa. The Northwestern states are the hardest hit.

Yesterday in Minnesota, a leading epidemiologist, Dr. Michael Osterholm, voiced the consensus of his colleagues internationally that, "I honestly believe that the next six to eight weeks will be the peak. By early to mid-October, I think we're going to see the peak in the Northern Hemisphere."

Osterholm was addressing an audience of 600 Minnesota medical and public health leaders, convened to try to devise medical care contingencies to deal with this prospect of an "early peak," in the absence of Federal action on the economic collapse, and on this H1N1/09 pandemic, and potentially more to come. Other states have been holding similar meetings for weeks.

In contrast, today in Congress, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius presented her usual litany about preparedness for the Fall flu wave, focussing on vaccination—which will not start until mid-to-late October, and mitigation, sneeze-in-your-sleeve, and so on. She announced that the FDA today granted contracts to four vaccine manufacturers for rush-orders of vaccine for Mid-October.

Osterholm, Director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota, explained several important features about the current rate of transmission of the New Flu. Already, in mid-September, the U.S. incidence rate of H1N1/09 is higher than the peak usually achieved in mid-Winter by the annual "seasonal flu," and even higher than the flu of 2007-2008 which was very high. Osterholm told MinnPost.com:

"I still believe, and I wish I was [sic] wrong, and I hope everybody proves me wrong on this...but I'm afraid too little vaccine is going to get here before the peak really hits...

"One of the major misconceptions of the situation is that this is a mild pandemic. In fact, it is a very mild illness for the vast majority of those who get it, maybe well into 98-99 percent range. But for that other 1 percent, this disease can be hell...."

As CIDRAP warned in a recent statement, logistics in depth are what is required, and do not exist. "H1N1 arrives at a time when emergency [U.S.] medicine nationwide is widely considered 'at the breaking point'...ER visits rose by 26% between 1992 and 2003, from 89.8 million to 114 million a year, while 425 emergency departments and 703 hospitals closed and the number of hospital beds in use shrank by 198,000...." Since then, it has declined even more.

Sebelius was confronted on several occasions on Tuesday about infrastructure, in her appearance at the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, but she dodged them all. Rep. Frank Pallone said that the ICUs (intensive care units) in his home district in New Jersey operate close to capacity, so, how "can we make sure" to care for people? A California Congresswoman said that in her district in Sacramento, the public health budget has been cut by 70 percent. They have lost three communicable disease specialists, two micro-biologists, field nurses, technicians and others. She asked, how will we monitor the disease? What if it mutates?

Sebelius punted. She said that there have been "billions of dollars invested in planning" for a surge. The worst scenarios are unlikely. And she stressed that the "walking well" should be steered away from hospitals, by good P.R. about how to suffer through the flu, in order to "diminish the strain" on the medical system.

Republican Committee members were rebuffed as off-topic, who raised any issue about the Obama health care "reform" proposals.

As of Sept. 5—the latest U.S. H1N1/09 mapping made available by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shows the geographic pattern of incidence as "widespread" in 10 states and one territory; the other states had regional, local, and sporadic cases. See www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly for the weekly map and breakdown. "Hot spots" are not always in the "widespread states. E.g., the University of Washington reported 2,000 cases as of last week, when the state population as a whole was still relatively unhit. Likewise, Cornell University had close to 500 cases as of this past weekend; one 20-year old male student died.