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The latest national survey conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) Project on the Public and Biological Security finds that when faced with a serious outbreak of pandemic flu, a large majority of Americans are willing to create significant alterations in their lives and cooperate with public health officials’ recommendations.

However, the survey also finds that a substantial share of Americans would have no one to care for them if they become ill or would face serious financial problems if they had to remain property from work for a week or far more.

To view the complete survey and Power Point slides see:

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/panflu/panflu_charts.ppt

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/panflu/panflu_release_topline.doc

Pandemic flu can be a term employed to describe a virulent human flu that causes a global outbreak, or pandemic, of serious illness. Because there is little natural immunity, the disease can spread very easily from person to person. At the moment, there is no pandemic flu, but health officials are concerned that the H5N1 avian flu which has triggered about 250 illnesses and deaths among individuals in Asia, Africa, and Europe could become a pandemic flu. No humans or poultry within the Americas have already been infected with this avian flu virus.

This HSPH survey was conducted to support public health officials in planning for a achievable outbreak of pandemic flu and was presented Thursday, Oct. 26 in Washington, D.C. at an Institute of Medicine workshop: Modeling Community Containment for Pandemic Influenza. HSPH Professor Marc Lipsitch also presented historical analyses of interventions inside the 1918 pandemic, comparing cities that intervened early and those that intervened late, to assess the difference in epidemic curves in these groups of cities.

This is the 1st report to attempt to tap the public’s intentions when faced using the certain circumstances of an outbreak. The men and women interviewed were 1st read a scenario about an outbreak of flu that spreads rapidly among humans and causes severe illness. They were then asked how they would respond to and be affected by the circumstances that would arise from such an outbreak.

Willingness to Cooperate with Public Well being Recommendations A lot more than three-fourths of Americans say they would cooperate if public well being officials advised that for 1 month they curtail various activities of their daily lives, such as employing public transportation, going towards the mall, and going to church (Figure 1). Far more than nine in ten (94%) say they would stay at residence away from other individuals for seven to ten days if they had pandemic flu (Figure two). Additionally, 85% say they and all members of their household would stay at property for that period if another member of their household was sick.

Nine in ten Americans (90%) say that if public well being officials suggested that they as well as the other members of their household stay in their town or city, they were likely to stay.

These findings speak to the resilience of the American public in the face of a prospective health crisis, stated Robert J. Blendon, Professor of Wellness Policy and Political Analysis in the Harvard School of Public Wellness.

The area exactly where anticipated cooperation is lowest involved the workplace. Whilst a majority (57%) of employed adults say they would remain house from work if public officials stated they ought to, even if their employers told them to come to function, about one-third (35%) say they would go to work.

Home Much more than eight in ten Americans (85%) say they would be able to take care of sick household members at home for 7 to 10 days, if public well being officials recommended it (Figure 2). However, about three-fourths (76%) say they would be worried that if they stayed at property with a household member who was sick from pandemic flu, they themselves would get sick from the illness.

Nearly three-fourths (73%) say they would have someone to take care of them at residence if they became sick with pandemic flu and had to remain at house for seven to ten days. Nonetheless, about one in four (24%) say they would not have someone to take care of them. More than 4 in ten men and women living in one-adult households (45%) and about 1 third of low-income (36%), African-American (34%), disabled (33%), and chronically ill (32%) adults say they would not have anyone to take care of them if they were sick and had to remain at residence that lengthy.

A substantial proportion of the public believes that they or a household member would be likely to experience various issues, including losing pay, being unable to get the well being care or prescription drugs they require, or getting unable to get care for an older or disabled person, if they stayed at house for seven to ten days and avoided get in touch with with anyone outside their household (Figure three).

School Closings If schools and daycare were closed for 1 month, 93% of adults who have major responsibility for young children under age 5 in daycare or age 5 to 17 and have at least 1 employed adult within the household think they would be able to arrange care so that at least one employed adult inside the household could go to work. Nearly as several (86%) would be in a position to do so if schools were closed for three months (Figure 4). Nonetheless, six in ten (60%) say that at least one employed person would have to stay house if schools were closed for a month.

Only one-fourth (25%) of employed individuals who have key responsibility for children under age five in daycare or age 5-17 in their household say that if schools and daycare closed for one month, they would be able to work from home and take care of the children.

More than nine in ten (95%) adults with major responsibility for young children age five to 17 report that they would be willing to give school lessons at house if schools were closed for 3 months.

More than eight in ten (85%) of these adults also think that if schools were closed for 3 months and public well being officials suggested it, they would be in a position to keep their children and teenagers from taking public transportation, going to public events, and gathering outside house although schools had been closed.

“A surprisingly large number of men and women would be able to keep their kids property and away from others if schools closed in the course of a severe pandemic,” stated Blendon.

About six in ten (64%) of these adults would want only a little or no aid at all in order to deal with the problems of having to stay home and keep kids at residence for a lengthy period of time. Of people who say they would need to have a lot or some help, half (50%) would rely most on help from loved ones, 11% on friends or neighbors, and 34% on outside agencies.

Work The survey asked employed Americans concerning the troubles they may have if they had been asked to stay out of work for seven to ten days, a month, and 3 months because of an outbreak of pandemic flu in their community.

The longer men and women are out of function, the greater the number of folks who will face financial difficulties. Even though most employed men and women (74%) believe they could miss seven to ten days of function without having serious financial troubles, one in 4 (25%) said they would face such issues. A majority (57%) think they would have serious financial issues if they had to miss work for 1 month, plus a total of three-fourths (76%) think they would have such issues if they were away from work for three months (Figure five).

Only about 3 in ten (29%) say that if they had to stay away from the workplace for one month, they would be able to function from house for that long.

Employed Americans were also asked about their current employers plans and policies for dealing with an outbreak of pandemic flu. Few working men and women (19%) are aware of any plan at their workplace to respond to a serious outbreak of pandemic flu. About one in 5 employed adults (22%) are very or somewhat worried that their employer would make them go to work even if they had been sick. Half (50%) believe that their workplace would remain open if public health officials suggested that some organizations in their community really should shut down. Only about one-third (35%) of employed Americans think that if they stayed house from work, they would nonetheless get paid; 42% think they would not get paid, and 22% do not know whether they would get paid or not.

“These findings are a wake-up call for business, that employees have serious financial concerns and are unclear concerning the workplace plans and policies for dealing with pandemic flu,” said Blendon.

Methodology This is the 25th in a series of studies by the Harvard School of Public Wellness Project on the Public and Biological Security. The study was designed and analyzed by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Well being (HSPH). The project director is Robert J. Blendon of the Harvard School of Public Wellness. The investigation team also includes John M. Benson and Kathleen J. Weldon of the Harvard School of Public Well being, and Melissa J. Herrmann of ICR/International Communications Investigation. Fieldwork was conducted via telephone for the Project by ICR/International Communications Study of Media (PA) between September 28 and October 5, 2006.

The survey was conducted with a representative national sample of 1,697 adults age 18 and over, such as an oversample of adults who had kids under age 18 in their households. Altogether 821 such adults with young children were interviewed. Inside the overall results, this group was weighted to its actual proportion (38%) of the total adult population.

The margin of error for the total sample is plus or minus 2.four percentage points.

Possible sources of non-sampling error include non-response bias, along with question wording and ordering effects. Non-response in telephone surveys produces some known biases in survey-derived estimates because participation tends to vary for distinct subgroups of the population. To compensate for these known biases, sample information are weighted towards the most recent Census data available from the Present Population Survey for gender, age, race, region, and education. Other techniques, including random-digit dialing, replicate subsamples, callbacks staggered more than occasions of day and days of the week, and systematic respondent selection within households, are utilised to ensure that the sample is representative.

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NEWS
Harvard School of Public Health
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Boston, MA 02115

The Harvard School of Public Well being Project on the Public and Biological Security is funded by a grant from the Association of State and Territorial Wellness Officials (ASTHO), which receives assistance from the Centers for Illness Control and Prevention. HSPH offers ASTHO along with the CDC with technical assistance for public wellness communication by monitoring the response of the general public to public wellness threats.

Harvard School of Public Health is dedicated to advancing the public’s well being via learning, discovery, and communication. More than 300 faculty members are engaged in teaching and training the 900-plus student body in a broad spectrum of disciplines crucial towards the health and well becoming of individuals and populations around the globe. Programs and projects range from the molecular biology of AIDS vaccines towards the epidemiology of cancer; from risk analysis to violence prevention; from maternal and children’s health to high quality of care measurement; from health care management to international wellness and human rights. For far more information on the school visit: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/

Contact: Robin Herman
Harvard School of Public Wellness