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Date: September 20, 2006
For Release: Immediately
Contact HHS Press Office
(202) 690-6343
STATEMENT BY MIKE LEAVITT
Secretary of Health and Human Services
On the International Partnership on Avian and Pandemic Influenza,
United Nations General Assembly
One year ago President Bush announced the International Partnership on
Avian and Pandemic Influenza, an effort to bring together key nations
and international organizations to improve the world's readiness for a
possible human influenza pandemic.
Since that announcement, the global effort to prepare for and respond to
a potential human influenza pandemic has gained momentum and strength.
The International Partnership has been an important element in support
of these global efforts to improve international disease surveillance,
transparency in the reporting of cases, the timeliness of such
reporting, and the response capabilities of affected nations.
In the past year, the H5N1 strain of avian flu has spread to more than
40 additional countries and has led to the deaths of hundreds of
millions of additional birds, which has heightened concern about the
potential for a human flu pandemic. Furthermore, the number of avian
flu cases in humans has more than doubled to more than 240 cases in 10
countries. Tragically, more than half of those persons infected have
died. This persistence of the avian flu virus to sustain itself and
spread reminds us of the urgency to redouble our efforts to be ready
should the avian flu virus evolve into a human pandemic.
In the United States, we have been making significant investments in
vaccines, antivirals, and research. This research is likely to benefit
not only citizens of the United States, but also citizens of the world.
Earlier this year, we recently awarded $1.0 billion in contracts to
develop cell-based vaccines against both seasonal and pandemic influenza
with the goal of having sufficient domestic vaccine production capacity
to vaccinate all Americans within 6 months of the declaration of a
pandemic. In addition, we are working on dose-sparing measures to
enable us to produce more treatment courses for more people and are
developing a library of live virus vaccine candidates against all known
influenza strains with pandemic potential. In addition, we have
developed rapid diagnostic testing for H5 strains that shorten testing
time. We are also looking at mitigation strategies should a pandemic
break out.
But responding to a pandemic will demand the cooperation of the world
community. No nation can go it alone. If a country is to protect its
own people, it must work together with other nations to protect the
people of the world.
I believe there are four principles of preparedness, and I have spoken
of them before: transparency, rapid reporting, sharing of data, and
scientific cooperation. The United States will do its part to advance
those principles.
We are funding the Specimen Transport Fund, managed by the Secretariat
of the World Health Organization (WHO). It is a key innovation in
getting samples from affected countries in a timely and secure fashion.
We also support early, voluntary compliance with the revised
International Health Regulations. We also have made sizeable
investments in creating a worldwide network of influenza surveillance,
through bilateral assistance, work with the WHO Secretariat and its
Regional Offices, and through partnerships with a number of
international labs. Furthermore, in response to President Bush's
commitment to forward-positioning a portion of U.S. antiviral stocks for
use in a human pandemic containment effort, we have deployed treatment
courses of Tamiflu to a secure location in Asia.
Today, I am pleased to renew our commitment to the International
Partnership. It is our collective global resources and cooperation that
will make our pandemic preparedness efforts a success and that will
position us as a global community to better prepared tomorrow than we
are today.
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