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Industry must prepare for bird flu pandemic
An Association of Corporate Travel Executives task force has met the Centre for Disease Control amid concerns about the threat of a bird flu pandemic.
The aim of the meeting was to confirm the nature of the threat and to identify the areas in which the business travel industry could move forward in pandemic preparation.
Awareness of the disease’s progress and the efforts to contain and treat it are now especially significant, according to ACTE.
Action by the association came as the UK’s chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson warned that more than 50,000 people could be killed if the deadly flu hit the country.
ACTE’s website will begin listing the most credible links to health and travel advisories, plus other available resources. The task force will monitor the activities of the CDC and the World Health Organization (WHO) and report accordingly.
It is likely the avian influenza pandemic issue will be a special focus of ACTE’s global conference in London on October 23-25.
“There is lot of confusion and unanswered questions regarding avian influenza,” said task force chairman and former ACTE president Mark Williams. “We want to eliminate panic by dispelling the misconceptions and provide the industry with reliable information.”
Association president Greeley Koch said: “The business travel industry’s response to an avian influenza pandemic has to match the scope of the threat.
“But the cost of anything less is unthinkable. Now is the time to plan and prepare, before regional outbreaks become global.”
Gearing up to deal with a pandemic, which may or may not occur, comes with a significant cost, and the price of this effort will be high, ACTE believes.
Agencies like the CDC are unable to easily alert travellers who may have been exposed to illness by a passenger sitting in an adjacent airline seats due to US and European privacy laws which prohibit airlines from tracking and releasing seat manifests and emergency contact numbers, according to ACTE.
Koch said: “Most people believe that government health organizations already have this capability. We’re now in the process of polling our members to gauge industry reaction to giving health organizations this authority.”
Report by Phil Davies
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