As the first wave of swine flu eases without causing a great deal of disruption there may be people out there thinking that, like the millenium bug, the “crisis” was over-blown?

Certainly in the northern hemisphere we seem to have escaped much of the potential harm -perhaps due to the early action taken to warn and inform the pubic and encourage good personal hygien practice.

Whilst most of the unfortunate deaths were of people with underlying health conditions, a significant portion (5 out of 8 last week) had no underlying symptoms – so there is no time for complacency!

Pandemics normally come in 3 phases.  The last bird flu pandemic in 1918 had 2 waves of flu then a third wave of palsy when the virus affected the brain rather than the lungs.  It is entirely possible that we could see a similar pattern with H1N1.

I believe that we will see a second more severe wave of H1N1 flu around Christmas as people gather for social functions.  The virus may by then have mixed and changed as it travels around the southern hemisphere (where cases continue to grow) and perhaps be either more or less deadly than the strain that we have seen so far – especially if it mixes with H5N1 “bird flu”.

So is it too late for businesses to prepare a flu plan?  Of course not.  A decent flu plan can be crafted by someone with prior experience in a matter of days.  The process is based on the British Standard for Business Continuity BS25999 but whereas this encourages the development of a Business Continuity Management System, you would only need to consider a few threats (ie not just absence but things like supply chain disruption etc).

Using our copyrighted Business MEDIC approach, we could develop an outline plan in one day, exercise it in another day and deliver a validated plan the following day.  If you have 3 days, you can have a plan that will considerably reduce the impact of pandemic flu on your business.

Please tell colleagues and business owners that you know about this service and help them protect their livelihood.  In a global recession, they may need all the help they can get.

@Veterus

08456 434775