Tonight:
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100,000 new swine flu cases every day ‘by next month’
Sophie Goodchild, Health and Social Affairs Correspondent2 Jul 2009
New cases of swine flu could reach 100,000 a day by next month, the Government says.
The warning came as Health Secretary Andy Burnham today said it was now impossible to contain the virus indefinitely.
Mr Burnham announced a shift in the approach to tackling the virus from “containment” to “treatment”.
Doctors will diagnose swine flu in patients instead of waiting for lab tests to give a positive confirmation. Patients will be told to stay at home while arrangements are made for them to get anti-viral drugs.
Until now, Health Protection Agency officials have been testing and swabbing everyone who has symptoms.
Mr Burnham said hundreds of people a day were now going down with the illness. “We have reached the next stage in management of the disease. The national focus will be on treating the increasing numbers affected by swine flu. We will move to this treatment phase across the UK with immediate effect,” he said.
The latest figures show there are 7,447 laboratory-confirmed cases in the UK, including at least 1,794 in London.
There have been three deaths — the latest a six-year-old girl in Birmingham.
Emergency planners at NHS London confirmed that plans were in place for the anti-viral drug Tamiflu to be handed out at hundreds of guarded sites.
Schools and police stations would be used and the drugs would be given to flu “buddies” acting on behalf of patients.
Each part of the capital will have between 10 and 70 points where people can pick up the medication through a specially issued registration number.
The Government's emergency planning committee Cobra will take the final decision on when to distribute Tamiflu. Lorry-loads of the drugs will be sent to distribution points from a warehouse at a secret location.
Some parts of the UK have already shifted to a “treatment” phase, including London on 19 June. But most of the country had still been taking a “containment” approach.
A spokesman for NHS London said the health service was coping but collection points would be set up if GPs became overwhelmed with cases.
Mr Burnham said antivirals would be offered to all those who have the illness with higher risk patients given priority.
The Government had signed contracts for enough vaccine to cover the whole population.
The first will become available next month with 60 million doses available by the end of the year.
It emerged today that a special helpline for distributing anti-virals will not be ready for another few weeks.
Reader views (1)
This is a very unpredictable situation. The only thing you can be sure of with this pandemic is that ministers and senior civil servants will have no difficulty getting access to Tamiflu.
- Andrew, London, 02/07/2009 15:27
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