Former FDA Director Dr Scott Gottlieb Predicts Tough Flu Season

Former Food and Drug Administration commissioner Dr Scott Gottlieb warned Wednesday that “we are ready for a huge” one influenza season due to a lack of immunity in the American population.

Gottlieb, who led the FDA under President Donald Trump and sits on the Pfizer board of directors, made the chilling prediction during a CNBC interview on workplace safety amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic .

“We haven’t seen a flu season last year – we’re about to be devastated because we haven’t immunized people for at least one and maybe now two years. When the flu comes back, and it comes back, it will come back very aggressively, ”he said.

Gottlieb explained that the nation “hasn’t had a lot of flu immunity in a number of years and so we need to be aware of that, we might see a situation this year or next year where you have. a very bad flu season.

“And if there is a mismatch between the flu vaccine and the circulating strain, it could be very serious. And then you’ll have COVID on top of that, so businesses are going to have to do things differently, ”he continued.

The former FDA chief said the country was moving from the pandemic phase of COVID-19 to “a more endemic phase, which means it’s going to become a persistent risk, a persistent virus that circulates every year, much like influenza”.

He added: “I think this is the last major wave of infection, although you see new variants, they are likely to emerge within the Delta lineage, and I hope we can. vaccinate them against them in the future. “

Gottlieb also said COVID-19 will circulate like the flu.

“I think it’s going to be at least equal to flu risk and we already have a flu season and so if you kind of overlap our regular flu season now with COVID season, and that causes a similar number of death and illness, ”he said.

The expert said companies need to think about how to create a safe working environment for their employees.

Among the measures he cited were the provision of more flexible hours, the ability to work remotely, the installation of better air filtration systems and the search for alternative modes of transport.

“I think the total blow to public health and also to productivity is going to be too big for us to maintain and continue as usual,” said Gottlieb, whose new book is titled “Uncontrolled Spread: Why Covid -19 crushed us and how We can beat the next pandemic.