Instapundit quotes an email from Dr. Patrick Cunningham at the University of Chicago, suggesting that the hype over
avian flu is overblown. Go read it yourself, but in a nutshell, the point is that medical science has evolved so far since 1918 that worries about 1918 death rates are not realistic. I don't disagree with anything Dr. Cunningham says in particular, but I think he is missing the forest for the trees.
I am not a physician, but I am a graduate of the UCLA School of Public Health. This may only be marginally better than saying I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but hopefully it qualifies me for the following comment:
The question is not whether a single avian flu patient would have a good chance of survival if they were treated in Houston instead of rural Vietnam. The question is how quickly our healthcare system would break if we ever had to face a true avian flu
pandemic. As soon as there were more patients requiring respirators than there are respirators in hospitals, we're basically screwed. If an avian flu epidemic hit the US during flu season, when hospital beds are already chock-a-block full with the frail elderly suffering from complications related to "regular" flu, we would reach this point quickly. After grandma and grandpa's funeral, the blamestorming would commence. It would make the public policy questions surrounding the response to Katrina look easy.
I do healthcare information technology for the
Air Force Medical Service. One of several projects I work on involves a public-private consortia of senior medical professionals that deal extensively with
travel medicine. I can tell you that everyone in this group is very concerned about avian flu.
Bottom line: Fearmongering bad, intelligent public health planning good.
BTW, don't miss
this excellent WashPost article about why an avian flu quarantine would not work.
