Family Security Matters » Publications » Exclusive: Swine Flu – Black Death, False Alarm or Mother Nature’s Bioweapon? (Part One of Two)

Family Security Matters » Publications » Exclusive: Swine Flu – Black Death, False Alarm or Mother Nature’s Bioweapon? (Part One of Two): "WHO Pandemic Levels

Here is a quick look at the WHO's pandemic alert phases:


* Phase 1: A virus in animals has caused no known infections in humans.
* Phase 2: An animal flu virus has caused infection in humans.
* Phase 3: Sporadic cases or small clusters of disease occur in humans. Human-to-human transmission, if any, is insufficient to cause community-level outbreaks.
* Phase 4: The risk for a pandemic is greatly increased but not certain. The disease-causing virus is able to cause community-level outbreaks.
* Phase 5: Still not a pandemic, but spread of disease between humans is occurring in more than one country of one WHO region.
* Phase 6: This is the pandemic level. Community-level outbreaks are in at least one additional country in a different WHO region from phase 5. A global pandemic is under way.


It is important to recognize that the WHO phase designation refers more to virus spread than the severity or lack there of associated with the resulting disease.

Echoing that thought, CDC Acting Director Richard Besser, MD, said that the U.S. is at a 'pre-pandemic' level and that it matters less what"