No delay to get flu plan in place

GUERNSEY must be prepared for a flu pandemic. Dr Liz McIntosh, head of the Cabinet Office emergency planning committee, said measures had to be put in place to reduce illness, save lives and help maintain essential services if one struck.

'We really don't know how bad the virus will be,' Dr McIntosh told business leaders and health professionals yesterday.

'It could be no more than a seasonal outbreak or it could be a flu pandemic which kills as many as 750,000 in the UK in just 15 weeks. So we need to be extremely flexible in the planning.

'But it's really important that we plan now.'

She said as many as 50% of the population could be affected.

'We need to think about how our services and our economy prepare.

'Some experts say we are well overdue so we need to make sure that people are getting the right information because we are all in this together.'

The UK carried out an exercise in February involving 5,000 people.

Dr McIntosh said the main messages to came out of that were that all sectors needed to plan and everybody needed to be engaged and use the right information.

'What we will do is encourage people to go about their business as usual because once the virus has arrived there is limited scope to avoid risk of spread,' she said.

'Anti-viral drugs don't make you immune to infection and they certainly don't offer long-term protection.

'A vaccination will not be available until the first wave of infection so for business continuity purposes you can forget about the vaccine.'

She said there had been a real push by employers to reduce sickness absence, but, if the virus struck, people who were infected should stay at home.

'There is real concern that there is going to be conflict between businesses and employees.'

She said one of the key messages was to address social conscience.

'We have become so reliant on GPs prescribing antibiotics that we have forgotten simple rules of personal health like washing our hands and putting our hands to our mouth when we cough or sneeze,' she said.

UK ministers have decided to close all schools in the event of a pandemic, which could reduce children's infection rates by 50%.

'I don't think ministers could have made any other decision,' she said.

'Large businesses could have 15% absence during the two- to three-week peak. Small businesses could lose 30% of staff.'

She said staff needed to be engaged at all levels in all sectors.

'Flexibility and correct information are the key.

'We need to dispel the myth that anti-viral drugs provide a magic cure, because they don't.'