Schwarzenegger Declares Swine Flu Emergency in California
April 28th, 2009Via: ABC News:
Alarmed by the growing number of swine flu cases and the possibility that a California man may have died from the disease, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency today to help deal with the outbreak.
The swine flu virus outbreak spread to two more states and the total number of cases confirmed in the U.S. jumped to 71, health officials said. That figure is expected to keep rising.
“I do expect more cases and expect more states to be affected,” Rear Admiral Dr. Anne Schuchat, interim deputy director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s science and public health program, told a Senate hearing today. “I think we need to be prepared that even if it starts to look a little better, it may get a little worse.”
California has confirmed 15 cases of swine flu, and today it was investigating whether two deaths occurred as a result of the virus. According to Los Angeles County public health official Jonathan Fielding, one of the deaths has been discounted as resulting from swine flu, but the other is still being investigated. If this case is confirmed, it would be the first death in the U.S. attributed to the illness.
Richard Besser, acting director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, declined to comment on the California investigation, but said, “I fully expect we will see deaths from this infection.”
Sheesh. I wonder how this compares to the number of Californians who die in car accidents?
Wonder why that hasn’t freaked people out?