Even just this little pipsqueak of an epidemic showed that we couldnt get vaccines to the people who needed it in time, even in the US — the country with one of the most advanced health systems in the world, says David Fedson, a retired infectious disease and vaccine expert from the University of Virginia. The vaccine prevented maybe 2 to 4 percent of swine flu deaths. The 2009 epidemic and stirrings of a potential H7N9 epidemic have mobilized Fedson and other public health experts to look for new ways to decrease the effects of seasonal and pandemic flu. And according to Fedson, one surprising group of drugs, called statins, might serve just that purpose.
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