Risk Management Solutions (RMS) has launched a probabilistic model for assessing the risk of influenza pandemics across multiple countries.
RMS said a probabilistic estimation of virus characteristics incorporating the recent H5N1 suggests that there is a one in five chance of a pandemic that is more severe than that experienced in 1918.
The 1918 pandemic had a mortality level of 0.67% in the US and even more severe effects in other countries.
H5N1, the virus that recently caused avian flu in Asia, has viral characteristics that will increase the likelihood of a virulent pandemic if it provides genetic material for human-to-human influenza transmission.
