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Vital Signs

Facts & Figures - On the ball

Predicting a pandemic

"It's clear that an influenza pandemic is overdue," declared Kathryn Kirkland, M.D., chair of DHMC's SARS/Influenza/Contagious Respiratory Infection Committee, in July 2005.

Past

20%
Worldwide infection rate from the 1918 "Spanish flu"

20 million to 40 million
Worldwide deaths from the 1918 flu

675,000
U.S. deaths from the 1918 flu (47% of all deaths that year)

September 1918
Boston Red Sox win the World Series

Present

108 / 54
Confirmed cases and deaths worldwide from avian flu, 1997-2005

36,000
U.S. deaths annually from seasonal flu

2 million to 7.4 million
Estimated deaths worldwide if avian flu becomes a pandemic

October 2004
Boston Red Sox win the World Series

Avian flu, Kirkland went on, is "a good candidate to cause a pandemic at this point. It's immunologically a new virus . . and it is highly virulent to humans. . . . Perhaps most worrisome of all, the Red Sox appear to be on a winning streak."

SOURCES: U.S. CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION AND A DHMC GRAND ROUNDS LECTURE BY KIRKLAND ON JULY 22, 2005


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