Sizing Up the Cost of a Flu Pandemic

This bit is from a UK Telegraph newspaper article that cites various estimates of how much a flu pandemic could cost the economy:

The World Bank estimated in 2008 that a flu pandemic could cost $3 trillion (£2 trillion) and result in a nearly 5pc drop in world gross domestic product. The World Bank has estimated that more than 70m people could die worldwide in a severe pandemic.

The problem with putting a $3 trillion cost on top of the $4 trillion financial crisis is really too scary to think about. I'm still hoping that this H1N1 strain is not significantly more deadly than normal flu. To my untrained eye, the initial panic was spurred by two factors:

• It is a new strain and that usually means the population will be unusually susceptible.
• The initial reports from Mexico of 80 deaths out of 900 cases implied a fatality rate of nearly 10% which was well above the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic which had a mortality rate of "only" 2% but was the most deadly outbreak recorded. The problem with the 10% rate is that it now appears that a very large number of cases were unrecorded because the didn't become serious and the lack of affordable health care in Mexico means that these people simply stayed home and dealt with their infection until they recovered. So the 10% rate is very misleading.