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Posted: 10:38 a.m. Sunday, April 26, 2009
By Jamie Dupree
Mention swine flu in a political context, and all I can think about is the troubles it presented the Gerald Ford Administration in 1976. Now swine flu has landed in the lap of President Obama.
In a special Sunday briefing at the White House, federal officials detailed an extensive set of actions dealing with a possible swine flu outbreak, and downplayed any threat to the President or his staff after a recent trip to Mexico, home to the outbreak.
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said the President's health was "never in any danger" after the Mexico trip, and that no staff members who had been on that trip had shown any hints of illness.
As of Sunday afternoon, there were 20 confirmed cases of swine flu in the United States, in New York, California, Texas, Kansas and Ohio.
Officials acknowledged the geographically odd nature of those five, which led acting Centers for Disease Control chief Dr. Richard Besser to warn that more cases are likely.
"The good news is that all of the individuals who have been identified as cases have recovered," said Besser, who didn't have a ready explanation for why the flu had killed people in Mexico, but not in the U.S.
"We've ramped up our surveillance around the country to try and understand better what is the scope, what is the magnitude of this outbreak around the country," Besser told reporters.
Since President Obama visited Mexico for two days earlier this month, there have obviously been questions about his own health, but officials said nothing is amiss.
The President's health was "never in any danger" according to officials, who were forced to acknowledge that Mr. Obama was out playing golf on an unusually hot Sunday in April while the briefing was ongoing.
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