H1N1:Where We Stand

Even before the WHO declared Influenza A H1N1 pandemic alert level phase 6, I have been following the progress of the disease in many countries, especially in the Philippines (where my parents and relatives are), Saudi Arabia (where my family lives), United Arab Emirates, Singapore, USA and Canada. I am deeply obsessed of knowing the latest information on the number of new cases being counted and the progress of treating the patients as well as on the efforts to control the spread of the virus. When I reach home, I relay the news to my husband. I talk to my family about it. I call my friends to update them. I feel that everyone needs to be aware in order to protect themselves from the spreading infection.

Being a pharmacist, although I am currently not engaged in professional practice, I have no doubt that scientists will be able to find a vaccine against H1N1 soon. I am always praying and hoping that a vaccine would be available and that drug manufacturing firms would exhaust all their resources to come up with a prophylactic drug to solve the pandemic.

The development of a vaccine takes on a long, arduous task for scientists- using several methods from seed strain, to mammalian eggs to virus genetic codes and caterpillar cells. As Influenza type A H1N1 strain was just recently discovered, it might take a while before the world receives its first vaccine.Right now, we should all pray that the drug be available before the virus could mutate in a pattern similar to the one the world had seen in the deadly 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, which claimed an estimated 20 to 50 million lives in many countries across the globe. After all, H1N1 is a virus and it could be very fatal.

Today there was a report that the number of infected people in Riyadh reached to 45. In the Philippines, the tally has reached 473. WHO has confirmed 52,160 cases with 231 deaths from only the 94 reporting countries. Yet, the number is rising every minute.

Since more than two weeks ago, rich countries started a race of making advance orders of the yet-to-be-released- Influenza type A H1N1 vaccine from giant pharmaceutical manufacturers. As per the reports, US government has confirmed advanced order of $811 million worth of the drug while UK, France, Belgium, Finland, Australia, and China had ordered 90, 50, 12.6, 5.3, 10, 4 million doses of advanced orders, respectively.

The question is if the world’s biggest vaccine-manufacturing companies would be able to produce enough vaccines for the world’s population. And if they do, when will the vaccine be released?If we’re able to answer those two questions, the third saddening question follows: will the underprivileged countries (like Philippines) be able to acquire the vaccine for the majority of its “poor” population?

WHO director-general Margaret Chan says it’s impossible to produce vaccine for all 6.5 billion people on the planet. Based on the WHO’s estimate last May, world capacity for producing vaccine against the novel influenza is about two billion doses. If an individual needs two shots for complete immunity, the vaccines will only be enough for 15 individuals in every 100 people.

When asked if the Philippine government should join the cluster of countries making advance orders for the upcoming vaccine, Dr. Yolanda Oliveros, director of the Department of Health (DOH)’s National Center for Disease Prevention and Control, said that they haven’t planned on placing an order yet because they have not determined the priority group. It means that the DOH should first identify to whom the vaccines should be made readily available as to the country’s priority. Quoting her statement, the determination of the group who will first benefit from the vaccine against A(H1N1) is dependent on the country’s goal,: Will it prioritize public service? Will it focus on economic sustainability, or will it concentrate on minimizing casualties? If it is social service, then health workers, policemen, and the military will be the priority. If it’s economic productivity, we will concentrate on working groups. But if the goal is reducing mortality then we will prioritize the very young and the very old.

How long it would take for the DOH to plan against further spread of the virus, remains another question. Have we not yet lost our trust in our government to protect us- or at least our loved ones back home?

Right now, we could only hope that Philippines is ready to take on the challenge of supporting the citizens if the worst of scenarios come.