Rush to stock up on flu vaccine - 紐澳

新聞來源: http://tinyurl.com/lhzwry

The Canberra Times- Rush to stock up on flu vaccine 2009.05.29
BY NATASHA RUDRA AND LOUIS ANDREWS

The Federal Government has placed an order for a new vaccine to fight swine
flu amid top-level predictions the virus could kill up to 6000 Australians.

As confirmed cases of the H1N1 influenza in Australia rose to 147 last night,
the nation's top medical official called for calm after ACT chief health
officer Charles Guest said swine flu could have a 20 per cent attack rate in
the population.

''We have about two or three thousand deaths from routine seasonal influenza
each year,'' Dr Guest said.

''Now if this virus is rather more virulent, but there were the same number
of infections, you might have, let's say, 6000 deaths.

''But what we're concerned about here is there may be an attack rate in the
whole population of 20 per cent. That would lead to a lot more deaths.''

But Australia's chief medical officer, Professor Jim Bishop, said some
figures that were bandied about were based on irrelevant data.

''The situation is we don't have sufficient cases in this country to model
what's happened based on our own experience,'' Professor Bishop said.

Canberra has three cases of swine flu, including a 43-year-old woman and a
21-year-old man who were passengers on the Pacific Dawn cruise liner which is
carrying three crew members with swine flu.

Authorities are trying to track down people who may have travelled with the
21-year-old on a coach from Sydney to Canberra.

--