U.S. Buys $100 Million of Bird Flu Vaccine

[jpak]

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/thrive/2005/sep/15/091506457.html

WASHINGTON (AP) - Mass production of a new vaccine that promises to protect against bird flu is poised to begin, as the government on Thursday agreed to stockpile $100 million worth of inoculations.

The new contract with French vaccine maker Sanofi-Pasteur marks a major scale-up in U.S. preparation for the possibility that the worrisome virus could spark an influenza pandemic.

While the vaccine is still experimental, preliminary results from the National Institutes of Health's first testing in people suggest the inoculations spur an immune response that would be strong enough to protect against known strains of the avian influenza, sparking the new investment.

But just how many doses the $100 million will buy isn't yet clear.

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[displacedtexan]

1. My physician just told me that...

regular flu shots will cost $127.00 this year, and that's for the same stuff from the same company he gets every year. He also said the company can't guarantee that there will be enough to go around.

Pitiful.

[0007]

4. Then the bird flu shot must be at least double, 'eh?

[rodeodance]

8. piddly small amount. and who will be eligible to recieve it? Congress?

[jpak]

9. I believe they are called "Pioneers" and their immediate families...

n/t

[anitar1]

10. Well, hell. If they allow too many tax payers to die,

what would the country do ? The U.S.is broke already. They need those tax monies coming in as the rich no longer pay taxes. So they would probably give those who work the vaccinations, along with the "Pioneers"

[napi21]

2. I guess it depends on who requested the buy, but if the CDC

really is that afraid of a pandemic, they are doing the right thing. I'm also sure it's leftover fear from being beaten up so bad last year on the flu shot shortage!

[depakid]

3. Trouble is, this vaccine will probably be worthless

against the variant that eventually breaks out. That's why other countries (notable Britian) have chosen not to purchase it and instead are stockpiling the only known treatment, Tamiflu.

[phantom power]

5. It's a very real possibility.

They would be idiots to not prepare for a pandemic. I'm pleasantly surprised that at least somebody is taking this seriously. Although Katrina has just demonstrated that just having resources is not the same as using them effectively.

[mojavekid]

7. $100,000,000 worth eh?,

Won't go very far, but at least far enough, Good to know that the wealthiest, the most privileged in the nation will be vaccinated. I shiver to think what this country would be like with it's top leadership compromised :sarcasm:

[phantom power]

6. If they can talk about spending $200 billion on Katrina response...

you'd think they could do better than a lousy $100 million on a threat that could very easily kill 10 times as many people as Katrina did. Conceivably a lot more than that.

[Delphinus]

11. What do they know that we don't?

Has the bird flu ever gotten inside the US border? I know SARS affected Canada last year (I think it was last year), but the bird flu is, so far, just an Asiatic disease, is it not? What are they planning?

[Kailassa]

12. racial profiling for the plague

What bothers me is that the government has discovered Blacks can react differently to a drug than whites, and there were suggestions during the SARS outbreak that it was much more deadly to asians than to caucasians. I dread Bush-co finding a way to infect one segment of the population while believing they are safe themselves.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/16/AR2005061601562.html

[NEOBuckeye]

14. This is nothing new -- Read up on George H. W. Bush and Eugenics

The Bushes have long admired the Nazis and Hitler's ideas of white aryan racial superiority. "Poppy" Bush Sr. himself sought a way to sterlize African Americans so that they would eventually die out, leaving more room on this planet for his oh, so clearly more superior stock.

One only need to glance at Poppy's wretched progeny to consider who really ought to be sterilized and banned from reproducing.

[Laelth]

13. ABC ran a spot on this thing after the speech ...

It was pretty horrifying. Predictions are that this flu, if it mutates into a form that can travel from human to human (which it can't yet), would, if it struck now, wipe out between 18-42 million Americans. (Someone who saw the show, please correct me if I read that graphic incorrectly.)

There is no vaccine for the virus yet, because the human-to-human form hasn't come into existence yet. Tamiflu is the only known treatment, and it's made by a single factory in Switzerland. Most industrialized nations have stockpiled enough of the treatment for about 1/4 of their nation's population. Our head of Health & Human Services says we're under-prepared ... only 3 million treatment sequences for nearly 300 million people. No way we can have enough by this upcoming flu season. Once again, the incompetent shrub administration puts us all in danger.

Bad, bad news.

-Laelth


Edit:Laelth--word choice.

[Delphinus]

15. I saw that.

I was thinking, after hearing what they said, that if I did come down with it, I'd like a way out that was not as painful. Since I'm going to die due to having it anyway, I think some form of quick, painless death would be appropriate. I just have to figure out what that way would be.

[Tyler Durden]

16. Wait. It'll happen. It ALWAYS DOES.