Joe Lieberman

I want to express my concern that hospitals and Public Health Departments do not have the capacity to care for the surge of people who may need hospitalization as a result of the spread of the virus.

Thus far, the Federal Government, I will say to the three of you Secretaries and your agencies, have responded aggressively and I think as effectively as possible to the threat of the H1N1 virus.

I leave here reassured by our state of preparedness, not with any superior knowledge about what path the influenza will take.

The advice now nationally and from the State is not to close schools, but to send kids home who seem to be sick.

I take it that in a lot of cases of people with H1N1, they will get over it because their bodies ultimately reject it or it finishes its course and the body gets better again.

My theory on this--and I am just observing--is that the government, HHS, CDC, should have done a large national announcement of a reduced list of people who had to go out and get the vaccine.

I must say, respectfully, I did not find the Secretary's response to our letter satisfactory.

22 million Americans have become ill with this virus; 98,000 people have needed hospitalization; and approximately, a little short of 4,000 people, including about 540 children, have passed away.

I thank you for all your good work in that regard and welcome your testimony now.

So you will be the point of distribution for Waterbury to private providers; is that right?

Oh, that is great; a healthy population up there.

I hope and I would guess that some of the response of the Vernon public school system was to the complaints that you registered last spring.

If this becomes more severe, I am sure we will do everything we can.

I assume, incidentally, that if a student is sent home or a worker is sent home from a job because they got the symptoms of H1N1, they really should stay home.

Of course, I never knew my grandmother because my dad was three when she got the flu in 1918 and died.

I am from the Federal Government and I am here to help.

Thanks very much for that testimony, Madam Secretary.

That is interesting.

Every time we get ready to deal with something like H1N1, we also prepare ourselves to deal better with other kinds of public health or natural or unnatural disasters.

But you will certainly be one of the points of distribution for people who come in and show that they are in one of the vulnerable or priority populations, and you will give them the vaccine right there.

Interesting. So what you will do then is to bring some nurses on----

I think there is a lot of reason for the American people to feel encouraged that the Federal Government is really there on this occasion protecting them.

How much does it cost you to implement such a system? And then what are the economic consequences and personal consequences on our country and our neighbors in Mexico?

I think if you do not, there will be growing pressure to really close the ports of entry.

At no time in our Nation's history have we been better prepared to deal with exactly this kind of crisis.