'Significant' new swine flu outbreak likely in US:

'Significant' new swine flu outbreak likely in US: Obama
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US President Barack Obama and top officials urged Americans Thursday to ramp up preparations against swine flu, warning that the virus could return with a vengeance in the fall and pledging a huge campaign to beat it.

"I think it's clear that although we were fortunate not to see a more serious situation in the spring when we first got news of this outbreak, the potential for a significant outbreak in the fall is looming," Obama said in remarks piped into a flu preparedness summit here from the G8 meeting in Italy.

"We want to make sure that we are not promoting panic, but we are promoting vigilance and preparation," he said.

Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at the meeting in Bethesda warned that (A)H1N1 flu "is not gone, it's continuing to spread, it's in more than 100 countries around the world and in every state in this country."

And, she warned, US scientists and health officials who have been monitoring the virus as it works its way through the southern hemisphere, think (A)H1N1 "could worsen in the fall or earlier, when schools start to open."

The White House has drawn up a battle plan for taking on the virus when influenza season returns to the northern hemisphere in several weeks' time.

A key facet of the four-tiered plan is vaccination.

"We know that a safe and effective vaccine is the best means of both preventing the disease in individuals and stopping the community spread of the virus.

"That's why we are researching a vaccine now and have already taken steps to purchase vaccine components," said Sebelius.

Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said clinical trials on a first candidate vaccine were expected to begin next month.

Scientists would pay attention in the tests to how quickly the vaccine triggers an immune response, he said, saying the knowledge would be crucial in the event of the disease returning in the fall flu season in a more virulent form and spreading rapidly.

Usually, the immune response from flu vaccines kicks in after around three weeks, he said, but the trials would test the (A)H1N1 vaccine candidates to see if they trigger an effective immune response within one week or a fortnight.

Sebelius told the meeting that "the current estimate is that some vaccine will be ready for distribution in mid-October." Fauci said there would probably be tens of millions of doses by then.

That would not be enough for a blanket vaccination campaign, so populations who have been shown to be at the greatest risk from the new strain of swine flu -- children, pregnant women and health workers who are dealing with the virus on a daily basis -- would likely be vaccinated in a first round of immunizations, the officials said.

A handful of pharmaceutical companies around the world are working to develop a vaccine against (A)H1N1 influenza, which the World Health Organization (WHO) says has infected 100,000 people in 137 countries and territories, and caused 440 deaths around the world.

US officials believe a million people in the United States may already have had swine flu, but because the first wave of infection has been relatively mild in the United States, those people did not seek medical care.

The relative mildness so far of swine flu in the United States has also led some people to become complacent in the face of (A)H1N1. They were wrong to do so, the officials said.

"This is a serious virus capable of causing severe disease and death. It is time to be vigilant. We must avoid complacency and ensure we are prepared to deal with whatever the fall flu season brings," said Sebelius.

The United States has the highest death toll from swine flu of any country in the world, with 170 dead. In Mexico, where the outbreak began in April, 121 people have died from the illness.

Sebelius said "preparedness grants" worth 350 million dollars will be made available to state and local public health authorities to help them step up preparations, and urged individuals and businesses to map out their own plans for tackling swine flu.