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US unprepared for bird flu pandemic: report

A plan developed by the Bush administration to deal with any possible outbreak of pandemic flu has concluded that the US is woefully unprepared for what could become the worst disaster in the nation's history.

A draft of the final plan, which has been years in the making and is expected to be released this month, says that a large outbreak that began in Asia would, because of modern travel patterns, probably reach the US within "a few months or even weeks."

If such an outbreak occurred, hospitals would become over-whelmed, riots would engulf vaccination clinics, and even power and food would be in short supply, the plan says.

The plan, a 381-page document obtained by the New York Times, calls for quarantine and travel restrictions but concedes that such measures "are unlikely to delay introduction of pandemic disease into the US by more than a month or two."

Supplements to the plan suggest ways that governments and hospitals and health care workers can prepare, by drafting legal documents, for example, that justify quarantining thousands.

The plan outlines a worst-case sequence of events in which more than 1.9 million US citizens die and nearly 9 million are hospitalized.

The plan, officially the Pandemic Influenza Strategic Plan, outlines how the Health and Human Services Department should react in a pandemic, but it skirts many essential decisions, among them, how the military might be deployed.

"The real shortcoming of the plan is that it doesn't say who's in charge," said a top health official who provided the plan to the New York Times. "We don't want to have a FEMA-like response, where it's not clear who's running what."

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the plan is not supposed to be distributed. The draft provided to the Times is dated Sept. 30, and is stamped "for internal HHS use only." The plan asks government officials to clear it by Oct. 6.

"It may be a while longer, but a pandemic will likely occur in the future," Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said. "Over the next couple of months, you will see a great deal of activity asking metropolitan areas, `Are you ready.' If not, here is what must be done."

Meanwhile, President George W. Bush asked vaccine makers on Friday to do their utmost to boost flu vaccine production, while officials from 80 countries met on ways to fight a pandemic.

US officials said the sessions served to raise the profile of the potential crisis and start setting up the networks needed to deal with outbreaks.

Last year there was a shortage of annual flu vaccine. Congress and HHS agencies have been working to find ways to lure companies back into the business of making it.

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