A draft of the government's plan to combat a potential super-flu estimates a death toll of up to almost 2 million Americans. The plan is being rewritten to designate who will run the country during a possibly chaotic period that could follow a mutation of a bird flu in Asia.
The draft is based on the last century's three pandemics, and states that in the best-case scenario, about 200,000 people could die.
The government currently has enough of the anti-flu drug Tamiflu to treat 4.3 million people, and $100 million worth of bird flu vaccine is being manufactured. The draft indicates that tens of millions more doses of each would be necessary, far more than can be manufactured quickly.