Rwilmer
Well-known member
Fighting flu
Staff and students at Cranfield University have designed a handy kit to help us deal with a flu pandemic.
Staff and students at Cranfield University have designed a handy kit to help us deal with a flu pandemic.
The bag, which is similar to a first aid kit, could be delivered to homes across the UK as soon as there is another pandemic, such as another wave of swine flu, which is expected in late autumn.
The small bag can be posted through the letter box and will contain vouchers to get items that you need to fill it with ? so things like alcohol hand gels, tissues, paracetamol and a small amount of water.
Dr Richard Barrett told Heart that they?ve been working with the NHS and the Bedfordshire and Luton Emergency Planning team on this for about a year now, before the advent of swine flu. He told us that one of the aims of this kit is to ?empower individuals and family units to take reliable actions and make decisions based on reliable information to protect and keep safe themselves and their families.?
Mid way through coming up with this kit swine flu broke out across the world.
Dr Richard Barrett told Heart ?To some extent this was a project we never wanted to have to use, because it means pandemic influenza has arrived? Working during pandemic flu is much more pressured, the flip side of that is that we?ve been able to connect with people much more closely and easily and immediately. That allows us to better understand how people will behave in the circumstance, it also allows us to find out how reliable information is, how people communicate with each other and how reliable that is.?
What we don?t get however, is how people behave in advance of a pandemic flu, so we don?t get an accurate picture as easily of how people respond further in advance. So if we said pandemic flu was coming in 2 or 3 years time would they take it seriously? We?ve got no accurate gauge for that now because pandemic influenza arrived.?
Both the Department of Health and the NHS are interested in this bag. Potentially, if a bag like this was required, it could be rolled out quickly and delivered to all homes. So if and when we get another wave of swine flu we might see a bag developed locally to be distributed around the country.
http://www.heartmk.co.uk/Article.asp?id=1475692
Staff and students at Cranfield University have designed a handy kit to help us deal with a flu pandemic.
Staff and students at Cranfield University have designed a handy kit to help us deal with a flu pandemic.
The bag, which is similar to a first aid kit, could be delivered to homes across the UK as soon as there is another pandemic, such as another wave of swine flu, which is expected in late autumn.
The small bag can be posted through the letter box and will contain vouchers to get items that you need to fill it with ? so things like alcohol hand gels, tissues, paracetamol and a small amount of water.
Dr Richard Barrett told Heart that they?ve been working with the NHS and the Bedfordshire and Luton Emergency Planning team on this for about a year now, before the advent of swine flu. He told us that one of the aims of this kit is to ?empower individuals and family units to take reliable actions and make decisions based on reliable information to protect and keep safe themselves and their families.?
Mid way through coming up with this kit swine flu broke out across the world.
Dr Richard Barrett told Heart ?To some extent this was a project we never wanted to have to use, because it means pandemic influenza has arrived? Working during pandemic flu is much more pressured, the flip side of that is that we?ve been able to connect with people much more closely and easily and immediately. That allows us to better understand how people will behave in the circumstance, it also allows us to find out how reliable information is, how people communicate with each other and how reliable that is.?
What we don?t get however, is how people behave in advance of a pandemic flu, so we don?t get an accurate picture as easily of how people respond further in advance. So if we said pandemic flu was coming in 2 or 3 years time would they take it seriously? We?ve got no accurate gauge for that now because pandemic influenza arrived.?
Both the Department of Health and the NHS are interested in this bag. Potentially, if a bag like this was required, it could be rolled out quickly and delivered to all homes. So if and when we get another wave of swine flu we might see a bag developed locally to be distributed around the country.
http://www.heartmk.co.uk/Article.asp?id=1475692