A third wave of the H1N1 virus, otherwise known as swine flu, is about to hit this country and the nation has to be more prepared to combat the virus as this time around it is going to be more vicious, a health educator and expert has warned.

Necia Holtzman, a health educator with the Occupational Productivity Consultants (OPC), a private firm which specialises in health, safety, environment and infection control, said the Government must intensify its education campaign and take more drastic steps to ensure that people are taking the necessary precautions to protect themselves from getting infected with the swine flu virus.

Holtzman said she recently attended the International Swine Flu Conference, hosted in Washington, where the health experts have predicted that the third wave of swine flu would hit later down in the year into next year 2010. She said she was not convinced that Trinidad and Tobago is sufficiently prepared for what lies ahead.

’They have said that the third wave should be taken very seriously because there is going to be an extremely severe and virulent attack which could result in a lot of deaths and could follow the pattern of the 1918 Spanish Flu,’ she said.

Holtzman said she was disappointed that Trinidad had no representatives from the various government agencies at the conference, which ’gave a lot of information on the virus’ and which reinforced the need to treat the situation with urgency.

She said she felt compelled to share this information with members of the public through the media ’not to cause anyone to panic’ but to reinforce that ’this is not the time for complacency.’

Holtzman said she has written to the various government agencies expressing her willingness to share the information garnered at the conference but has not yet received any response. While she expressed the view that the government needs to do more to prepare citizens for what was ahead, she also stressed that the private sector and all citizens had a responsibility to take care of their own personal health.

She said OPC intends to host seminars over the coming weeks that will cater to business professionals who will be educated on how to survive the period of the swine flu pandemic. Holtzman said it is expected that there will be an increase in absenteeism in the work environment once the third wave hits, and she said business owners and other employers should be schooled on how to cope with the situation.

However Dr Carol Boyd-Scobie, country representative of the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO/WHO), yesterday dismissed claims that a third wave of swine flu was about to hit this country.

Boyd-Scobie said, ’At this point in time since it (H1N1 virus) started off in the Northern Hemisphere in Mexico and the US we are looking at a second wave. We don’t know what will happen next year but we wouldn’t get the third wave yet.’

Health Minister Jerry Narace was also critical, saying that the claim of a third wave of swine flu was ’far-reaching.’