H1N1 matches seasonal flu peak months early -CDC
* Pandemic hits peak comparable to seasonal winter flu
* 1,000 killed in U.S., 20,000 hospitalized
WASHINGTON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - H1N1 swine flu has becomewidespread in 46 of the 50 U.S. states, a level comparable to thepeak of ordinary flu seasons but far earlier and with more wavesof infection expected, a top U.S. health official said on Friday.
"Forty-six states having widespread transmission is the peakof flu season. To be basically in the peak of flu season inOctober is extremely unusual," said Dr Thomas Frieden, thedirector of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Frieden said seasonal flu normally peaks sometime between lateNovember and early March. And he noted that this virus wassickening young adults and children as opposed to seasonal flu,which usually hits people over 65 the hardest.
"We expect that influenza will occur in waves and we can'tpredict how high, how far or how long the wave will go or when thenext will come," he told reporters in a telephone briefing.
Swine flu has killed more than 1,000 Americans and put morethan 20,000 in the hospital in the United States since it emergedearlier this year, Frieden said.
But health officials are quick to note that the actual numberof cases cannot be measured. "We have had up until now manymillions of cases of pandemic influenza in the U.S. and thenumbers continue to increase," Frieden said.
In a separate statement on Friday, the World HealthOrganization reported more than 414,000 laboratory confirmed casesof H1N1 worldwide, with nearly 5,000 deaths.
But the Geneva-based health agency noted that the figures wereonly the tip of the iceberg.
"As many countries have stopped counting individual cases,particularly of milder illness, the case count is significantlylower than the actual number of cases that have occurred," WHOsaid.
Frieden said swine flu manufacturers have produced 16.1million doses of vaccine, and as of Wednesday, 11.3 million doseshad been shipped to U.S. states.
The U.S. government initially expected to have 40 milliondoses of vaccine available by the end of October but last week cutthat projection by 25 to 30 percent, saying production problemswould limit the October supply to 28 million to 30 million doses.
"Vaccine production is much less predictable than we wish. Weare nowhere near where we thought we'd be by now. We are not nearwhere the vaccine manufacturers predicted we would be," Friedensaid.
Much of the vaccine currently available is a nasal spray fromAstraZeneca's (AZN.L) unit MedImmune.
The Obama administration has ordered vaccine from fivemanufacturers: Sanofi-Aventis SA (SASY.PA), CSL Ltd (CSL.AX),Novartis AG (NOVN.VX), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.L) and AstraZeneca'sMedImmune. (Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Maggie Fox and EricBeech)
Source: Reuters
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