A flu pandemic could threaten lives and cause disruption to the economy, experts say REUTERSA flu pandemic is one of the most significant civil emergencies that the country could face, with the possibility of hundreds of thousands of deaths, the government has said. The so-called Tier 1 risk would cost tens of billions of pounds, according to Whitehall’s first biological security strategy. The document, which aims to set out in one place the “wide range of activity” taken by the government to protect the population from disease outbreaks, also rates the growth of microbe resistance to antibiotics as a significant risk, which according to one estimate will account for an extra 10 million deaths a year globally. The government has an ambition to reduce inappropriate antibiotic prescribing by 50 per cent. Ben Wallace, the security minister, said: “Significant outbreaks…

Source: The Times July 31, 2018 22:52 UTC