US readies flu pandemic response plan: report

The U.S. government would expand the Internet and possibly permit foreign countries to print U.S. currency during a flu pandemic, under a national response plan that could be approved within days by President George W. Bush, the Washington Post reported on Saturday.
An article on the newspaper's Web site said the document is the first to spell out how the government would detect and respond to a flu outbreak and continue to function through what could be an 18-month crisis capable of killing up to 1.9 million Americans.
The 240-page response plan identifies more than 300 specific tasks for federal agencies, including determining which frontline workers should be vaccinated first and expanding the Internet to accommodate a likely flood of people working from their home computers.
The newspaper said the Treasury Department is poised to sign agreements with other nations to produce currency if U.S. mints cannot operate.
The Pentagon, anticipating difficulties acquiring supplies from the Far East, is considering stockpiling millions of latex gloves.
The article, which was also to appear in the Post's Sunday editions, said the Department of Veterans Affairs has developed a drive-through medical exam to quickly assess patients who suspect they have been infected by the virus.
Bush is expected to approve the plan within a week, the article said.
The White House is eager to show it can manage the medical, security and economic fallout from a major outbreak following its widely criticized to Hurricane Katrina, the Post said. Concern about a possible pandemic has grown with the emergence of the H5N1 avian flu, the most dangerous strain in decades.
Bush is expected to adopt post-Katrina recommendations that a new interagency task force coordinate the federal response and a high-level Disaster Response Group resolve disputes among agencies or states, the newspaper said. Neither entity has been created.
When the response plan is issued, the Post said U.S. officials intend to announce several vaccine manufacturing contracts to jump-start an industry that has declined in recent decades.
To keep the 1.8 million federal workers healthy and productive through a pandemic, the Bush administration would tap into its secure stash of medications, cancel large gatherings, encourage schools to close and shift air traffic controllers to the busier hubs.
The newspaper said retired federal employees would be summoned back to work, and National Guard troops could be dispatched to cities facing possible insurrection.
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