Queensland plans for a disaster it hopes will never happen
An Asian bird flu pandemic could kill up to 4000 people in Queensland and cause 500,000 to fall ill according to a worst-case scenario estimate by the state's health department.
The analysis, contained in an internal Queensland Health document made public yesterday, suggested almost 14,000 people could require admission to a hospital during an outbreak.
The sobering estimates come as federal authorities argue about the nation's preparedness to face avian influenza. The Health Minister, Tony Abbott, has warned Australia may have to cope with numbers of deaths not seen since World War II and that anti-viral medicines could be exhausted within about six weeks.
However, the Commonwealth's chief medical officer, John Horvath, has expressed confidence in the ability of the health system to cope with an outbreak and suggested a pandemic might not necessarily represent a disaster.
The Queensland Health estimates are based on infection rates between 15 and 35 per cent recorded in several flu pandemics last century, including the Spanish flu in 1918-9. Infection rates for a pandemic are much higher than less deadly strains of flu. "The difference with the pandemic flu is there's no immunity because it's a new flu strain," said Linda Selvey, the director of Queensland Health's Communicable Disease Unit. "In that situation the attack rate and the number of people getting sick will be high."
Dr Selvey cautioned there was no present risk of an outbreak in Australia. "This is all planning for an eventuality that might never occur," she said.
NSW Health has not done its own modelling.
However, the federal Health Department has estimated the impact of a pandemic affecting 25 per cent of the population if there were no vaccine or treatment available. Over six to eight weeks it could lead to between 13,000 and 44,000 deaths and between 57,900 and 148,000 people in hospital. But the department warns "the figures are estimates only and the likely outcomes associated with a pandemic will depend upon many factors".
Queensland Health's response plan could include shutting schools and closing public places such as cinemas in an effort to slow the spread of the virus.