|
|
  |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bush to order smallpox vaccinations for military
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush plans to announce Friday that he is directing 500,000 members of the U.S. military to receive vaccinations against smallpox, a senior administration official said Wednesday. The directive will be the first part of a coordinated program to protect Americans against a possible bioterror attack. The vaccine will be administered in phases, said the official. Military personnel would receive the inoculation first, then emergency health care providers on a voluntary basis, followed by police, firefighters, and other first responders. Bush said the vaccine would be made available to all Americans on a voluntary basis, but the senior administration official was not sure when it would be offered to the general public. "I think it ought to be a voluntary plan," Bush told ABC's "20/20" in an interview, portions of which were released Wednesday. "What's going to be very important is for us to make sure that there's ample information for people to make a wise decision." The decision to begin mass smallpox vaccinations follows months of intensive consultations between the administration and health officials around the world. Some health officials have called it one of the toughest medical decisions a president has ever had to make. The World Health Organization declared smallpox eradicated worldwide in 1980, and the immunization programs that led to the virus' disappearance were discontinued. Routine smallpox inoculations in the United States ended in 1972. But many officials fear terrorists might have obtained samples of the virus for use as a biological weapon. One administration worry is that the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein might have smallpox samples. Because only about half of U.S. residents have never been vaccinated, and those who were vaccinated are believed to now have limited immunity if any, the country is an especially vulnerable target. "We have a substantially non-immune population, and that's a very risky situation if we face a malicious bioterrorism dissemination of smallpox," said Dr. Bill Bicknell, with the Boston University School of Public Health in Massachusetts. Since the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, Bush had been weighing the potentially devastating effects of a possible smallpox bioterror attack versus the sometimes lethal side effects of the vaccine. "He wanted to understand the issue and get advice from many people. This is not an easy decision to make. At the end of the day, we could kill some people," another administration official said. This official told CNN in recent weeks that under the Bush administration plan about 500,000 health care workers would be vaccinated, followed up by a second wave of vaccinations for 7 million to 10 million more first responders. The vaccine does not contain the smallpox virus. It is made from vaccinia, a related virus that helps the body produce immunity to smallpox. Most people experience normal, usually mild reactions to the vaccine, according to health officials. In recent tests, one in three people felt bad enough to miss work or school or had trouble sleeping. But about 1,000 out of every 1 million people vaccinated are expected to need medical attention. One or two people out of every million who get the vaccine will die from it, health officials estimate. Some say the risk is worth it. Smallpox is a virus that kills one in every three people it infects, and most survivors are disfigured. "It was one of the most frightening, devastating scourges of mankind that ever existed," said Dr. Steven Black, a pediatric infectious disease specialist with the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center. At the time the WHO launched its immunization program in 1967, 2 million to 3 million people worldwide died each year from smallpox. In the 20th century alone, smallpox claimed the lives of 500 million people. The last naturally occurring case of smallpox was reported in Somalia in 1977. "It would go through populations much like the black plague did and kill off scores of individuals. This is a very painful, frightening death," Black said. Other health officials maintain the side effects are too great -- that even one death from the vaccine is too much. Dr. Carlos del Rio, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, counts himself as one of those professionals urging caution. "I think if we start vaccinating massively right now because we may get smallpox, I think it would be a big mistake," he said. Some who fall under the proposed Bush program should not get the vaccine because of pre-existing medical conditions that would spur severe side effects, health officials say. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the people most at risk for vaccine side effects are those who: • have skin conditions, such as eczema • have immune deficiency disorders • are receiving cancer treatment • are getting an organ transplant • have complications from HIV • are pregnant or breast-feeding In September, the CDC put together guidelines for all 50 states and the District of Columbia with instructions on how to vaccinate entire populations within a week of an outbreak. CNN correspondents Frank Buckley and Elizabeth Cohen contributed to this report. Copyright 2002 CNN. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report.
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
