# 3426
It’s one heck of a prediction, particularly given that August is hardly known for being a `flu month’, but that’s the number that Britain’s Health Minister, Andy Burnham, used to quantify the likely impact of the H1N1 virus in Britain.
It’s a `guestimate’ of course, and one that can’t really be checked. It’s not as if they are counting the number of cases now.
Suffice to say, an awful lot of people are expected to catch this novel virus over the coming months.
And that number is likely to increase now that the UK no longer plans to give out prophylactic antivirals to the contacts of those who are indentified as being infected.
Official: 100,000 swine flu cases daily by August
The Associated Press
Thursday, July 2, 2009; 8:04 AM
LONDON -- Britain's health minister Andy Burnham says the country could have 100,000 new cases of swine flu every day by August.
The World Health Organization has said that 2 billion people could be infected with swine flu worldwide. Most cases are mild and require no medical treatment to get better. More than 77,000 cases, including 332 deaths, have been reported worldwide.
Burnham announced in the House of Commons Thursday that Britain was going to stop liberally giving out Tamiflu to all cases and their contacts, and that the antiviral would only be used to treat patients. Many experts have criticized Britain's approach to the outbreak for wasting resources and drugs.
