Government sets out new flu pandemic plan

Health secretary Alan Johnson has published a new plan in preparation against a possible flu pandemic.

The strategy is intended to increase preparedness and better protect the public against a ‘worst case scenario’ of a significant pandemic hitting the country.

As well as signing agreements with two pharmaceutical companies to supply sufficient pandemic-specific vaccine, the Department of Health outlined other countermeasures.

These include doubling the stock of antivirals to cover at least half the population as well as buying 14.7 million courses of antibiotics and 350 million surgical masks and 34 million respirators for NHS staff on the frontline.

The government also stated that it now had a stockpile of 3.3 million doses of H5N1 pre-pandemic vaccine for healthcare workers and would be consulting the scientific evidence in order to inform future decisions on pre-pandemic vaccines.

Alan Johnson illustrated that the threat of an influenza pandemic remained real and that it was a top priority for the government do all that was possible to protect the public.

“Our new plans provide the first national blueprint for the UK’s response to a pandemic flu. We are strengthening our countermeasures to ensure we have the necessary vaccines, antibiotics and antivirals to protect the population if the worst were to happen,” he confirmed.

Earlier this year, the government signed contracts worth ?155.4 million with GlaxoSmithKline and Baxter Healthcare for the supply of pandemic flu vaccines.