President Obama Mobilizing Nurses against "Administrative Hurdles" Patient Oriented

[ProfessorMurder]

washingtonpost.com

White House officials played down the dramatic language,

The declaration allows Sebelius to waive certain requirements under
Medicaire and Medicaid, privacy rules and other regulations.


At least one hospital in Tennessee and another in Texas recently set up
tents in their parking lots to screen those suspected of having swine flu;
those tents did not require waivers because they were used for screening,
not treatment.

"We know a number of hospitals are already experiencing high but
manageable loads. It's not a stretch to imagine that hospitals could be
strained," said Jennifer Nuzzo of the University of Pittsburgh's Center for
Biosecurity. "It's a just a precautionary move, so if need be we can focus on

the care of patients rather than focus on administrative hurdles. In disasters,
you often don't have the time or luxury to keep the paperwork in order. You
want hospitals focusing on patients."
Obama's declaration could sharply increase demand for the vaccine, which is
becoming available much more slowly than originally expected.


"I also wonder whether the increasing impact of H1N1, coupled with the
presidential declaration, will make the U.S. move more slowly in sharing the H1
N1 vaccine it promised to donate to developing countries . . . especially in
light of all the problems being experienced with access to the vaccine in the
U.S. now and for the foreseeable future," Fidler wrote in an e-mail.



*There are reports that "whoever" ordered 40 million, only 16 are available.
*Rich nations are stock piling sweden ordering double it's needed amount.

*Some believe it is a 'Dangerous' Supply/Demand Scam, deliberatly slowing
down the incubation process while diverting annual flu production.




Quest for swine flu vaccine giving some firms a boost - The Boston Globe


For a handful of drug makers, including the Novartis AG vaccine division in
Cambridge, the global effort to combat the swine flu is turning out to be good
business, bringing them a $7 billion windfall.

The global market for vaccines is projected to more than double from $16
billion in 2007, the most recent year for which data are available, to $35
billion in 2014, according to Cambridge consulting firm Scientia Advisors.

“With a pandemic like this, the upside for us is clearly significant,’’ said Andrin
Oswald, chief executive of Cambridge-based Novartis Vaccines and
Diagnostics, a unit of the Swiss pharmaceutical giant. “The quicker we can
ramp up our volume, the better it will be for people in the United States and
around the world.’’

Novartis and four other drug makers - Sanofi-aventis, GlaxoSmithKline, CSL
Limited, and MedImmune - heeded the call to action by health officials when
swine flu was identified last spring.

They quickly accelerated production of seasonal flu vaccine to free up
capacity to make H1N1 vaccine, revamping their distribution systems and
wrestling with low “yields’’ (bullshit) of inactivated virus strains in their egg-based
swine flu vaccine production system. Shipments began last month and are
expected to continue into next year.

Novartis expects to generate $900 million in the US and $1.2 billion worldwide
from swine flu vaccine orders. That represents a small fraction of the $40
billion the company rings up annually in global biopharmaceutical sales, but
it’s a big revenue boost for its vaccine division, which reported $1.7 billion in sales for 2008.


“Investors are looking at this as a one-time event,’’ said Jason M. Gerberry,
associate analyst at Leerink Swann. “These companies will report a revenue
benefit in the fourth quarter of this year and the first half of next year, when
the product is delivered. But each company’s also learning how to respond
and how to shift capacity in real time.’’


Even before the swine flu outbreak, several factors were driving anticipated
growth in the vaccine market, including the aging of populations in the United
States and other Western countries, making them more susceptible to viruses
and bacterial infections, and a rising interest by developing countries in
vaccinating people.

“When China comes out and says it’s going to have a national vaccine
program, that’s music to the ears of these companies,’’ said Henry Glorikian,
managing partner of Scientia Advisors. China, however, has its own fledgling
sector of drug companies that are preparing vaccines for influenza and other
viruses.

In responding to swine flu, drug makers uncovered some deficiencies and
inefficiencies in their supply chains.


One of the biggest for Novartis was a shortage of chickens that could
produce the eggs in which vaccines are grown. Another was the discovery
that virus yields were lower for the H1N1 vaccine than for seasonal flu
vaccines - one dose of swine flu vaccine for every two eggs, compared with
two doses of seasonal flu vaccine per egg - delaying shipments until later
than initially hoped for.