SHOOT: Can caution do any harm at this point?
April 27 (Bloomberg) -- The World Health Organization will
raise its pandemic alert to an unprecedented level today, saying
that swine flu is spreading across North America, two people
familiar with the agency said.
An increase above level 3 on the WHO’s six-step alert
system would be the first since the United Nations agency began
grading the pandemic risks in 1999. The agency’s pandemic
guidelines say the goal of a level 4 pandemic phase is
“containment of the new virus within a limited area or delay of
its spread,” suggesting the change will trigger travel
warnings.
The swine flu’s spread in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada is
heightening concern that the virus may spark the world’s first
influenza pandemic since the 1968 Hong Kong flu, which killed as
many as 4 million people.
“The tenor at the moment is they should call it a
pandemic,” said John Oxford, a virologist at Retroscreen
Virology Ltd. in London. “We’ve seen how it’s moving.”
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