Pandemic Influenza Preparedness and Response Planning: Guidelines for Community Corrections

摘要

On June 11, 2009, the World Health Organization (WHO) raised its pandemic alert level to Phase 6, officially declaring the first pandemic of the 21st Century. Beginning in mid-March 2009, when respiratory illness caused by the novel H1N1 influenza virus, the .Swine Flu,. occurred in the Mexican State of Veracruz, the outbreak quickly spread to the United States and the rest of the world. For the week ending June 20, 2009, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported 27,717 confirmed cases of H1N1 influenza and 127 deaths, with illness reported by all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. As of June 26, 2009, WHO reported a total of 59,814 confirmed cases and 263 deaths worldwide--a fatality rate of less than one half of one percent. Although WHO has assessed this pandemic to be of moderate severity,5,6 it nonetheless raised its alert to Phase 6, the highest level, due to ongoing community-level outbreaks in multiple regions around the world. Thus, the pandemic was declared in response to the size of the area affected by the H1N1 virus, rather than to the severity of the illness it has caused to date.