John M. Barry, a visiting scholar at the Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research, is the author of The Great Influenza. He wrote "Move quickly to create a flu vaccine" for The New York Times, also published in the Times Picayune (New Orleans) - Wednesday, April 29, 2009.

... the gap between the time the virus was first recognized and a second, more dangerous wave swelled was about six months. It will take a minimum of four months to produce vaccine in any volume, possibly longer, and much longer than that to produce enough vaccine to protect most Americans. The race has begun."