Why the World Isn’t Ready for the Coming Influenza Pandemic,
World Health Organization Warns

A global influenza pandemic isn’t something that most people think about on a day-to-day basis. But it could soon become front-page news, if the fears of the World Health Organization are realized. The group is concerned about the ripening conditions for a global outbreak of a particular bird flu strain currently present in Asia. What makes this situation all the more serious is the humbling fact that the world simply doesn’t have the manufacturing or distribution capacity to provide flu vaccinations to many people.

This frightening fact became quite evident this year with the shortage of flu shots in the United States. But it was also true in past flu pandemics such as the outbreak of 1918 which killed a startling 40 to 50 million people around the world, according to the World Health Organization. And that was at a time when the global population was much lower than it is today. Population density was also lower, and it was extremely difficult for people to travel from one region to the next. Even though, as many as 50 million people were killed by a single strain of the influenza virus.
Today, conditions are far more favorable to the spread of infectious disease. With high population density, and ease of air travel around the world, an outbreak could spread to virtually every city in the world in a matter of a few days. From there, it could spread relatively easily to citizens of those cities. That’s why estimates of the number of people who could die in the next influenza pandemic are reaching astronomical proportions.

The US-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that between 2 million and 7.4 million deaths would occur globally from the outbreak. But other scientists are offering much higher estimates: one noted Russian scientists estimates that as many as one billion people around the world could be killed by a viral outbreak that’s expected to arrive soon. He simultaneously estimates hundreds of thousands would be killed in the United States alone.

So what’s the correct number? Nobody knows, of course, but it’s safe to assume that US authorities would downplay the numbers in order to avoid a public panic once the outbreak begins. After all, it now looks fairly certain that the United States won’t be prepared for a pandemic, so the smart political play will be to minimize the number of reported fatalities caused by such an outbreak in order to avoid public criticism for not being prepared.

Right now, 50 people representing drug companies, governments, and vaccine licensing agencies are meeting in Geneva in a closed-door session to discuss what can be done to prevent this next coming flu pandemic. The World Health Organization has flatly stated there will not be enough vaccine to go around. On their web site, they say, “production capacity for a pandemic vaccine will be vastly inadequate unless other companies
engage in vaccine seed development and preparation of batches for clinical testing.” The group also stated that in the event of a pandemic, vaccine will be in short supply and will likely be unequally distributed.

Most people don’t know that deadly flew pandemics appear approximately once every 27 years on our planet. As already mentioned, the 1918 influenza pandemic killed up to 50 million people. Other pandemics occurred in 1957 and 1968, well after the development of antibiotics, which turned out to be all but useless against infectious viral strains. Today, we are past due for the next viral outbreak, and many experts in the area of disease control and infectious diseases are predicting that the H5N1 bird flu strain is a likely candidate to make the cross-species jump and become the next infectious agent for humans.