New System May Help Plan for Flu Outbreak

February 1st, 2007 in Medicine & Health / Diseases
New System May Help Plan for Flu Outbreak (AP)

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Julie Gerberding, right, and Mitchell Cohen confer during a large-scale exercise to see how well the CDC would react to a pandemic flu outbreak, in Atlanta Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2007. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)

(AP) -- The government will predict the severity of the next flu pandemic just like forecasters predict hurricane strength - using a ranking system unveiled Thursday to help states determine when they should take increasingly strong steps to combat flu's spread.

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