Global News Journal
Beyond the World news headlines
Is swine flu getting worse?
No, says the U.S. federal government, but officials finally have enough data to give a good picture of the pandemic and it isn’t pretty. The CDC estimates that 22 million Americans caught swine flu in the first six months of the pandemic and 3,900 people died.
This includes 540 children.
So why the big jump in numbers? In a country of 300 million people, it takes some time to do a count. The US doesn’t have an organized public health system and states and cities lack enough staff to crunch the numbers in real-time. So the CDC takes a representative, detailed sampling from 10 states and then extrapolates this to the total US population. The latest figures are the first to give a good estimate of how extensive the pandemic is so far.
The CDC is pushing vaccines but at the same time, supply is spotty and people are often suspicious of them. Americans are not alone in this mistrust, by the way – check here for an unpdate on what is happening in Europe. And here is one creative way to help prevent the spread…
from Summit Notebook:
Swine flu sales: windfall or hard work?
Swine flu is turning out to be a sales bonanza for drug companies - just don't call it a windfall, says GlaxoSmithKline.
As one of the world's top suppliers of both vaccines and antiviral medicine, CEO Andrew Witty resents the implication that billions of dollars of business simply fell into his company's lap when the World Health Organisation declared H1N1 a pandemic in June.
"For me the word windfall means you're walking down the street and something fell out of the sky," he told the Reuters Health Summit. "We've spent the best part of 15 years investing for this situation and our ability to manufacture and supply potentially 500 million or so doses (of vaccine) is all because of these investments."
Swine flu vaccination finally starts
Swine flu vaccination is under way in the US, although the CDC admits it is a bumpy start .
The World Health Organization is worried that people may believe rumors about the safety of the vaccine and avoid it . What could happen with H1N1 anyway?
All this is great news for vaccine makers
My three-year old son was hospitalized with pneumonia twice last winter, and consequently developed asthma. He was a 32 week preemie, who had RSV at 8 months old. No one would argue that my son is not “high risk” within what the CDC has already catagorized as a “high risk group.” However, I have yet to find a single government official who can arrange for my son to receive the injectable form of the h1n1 virus. As an asthma sufferer, he cannot have the live vaccine in FluMist.
Almost every website tells parents to ask their child’s pediatrician for more information on the vaccine. However, in CT, where my child’s pediatric practice is located, many doctors, including our practice, for some unfathomable reason, have chosen NOT to order the h1n1 vaccine. We are left to find clinics on our own, even for high risk children. Our local hospital in Stamford, CT, will only give FluMist to children in my son’s age group. My son’s medical history rules out FluMist as an appropriate choice. However, they will only give the intectable to children under 36 months. My son is three and a half.
I have spoken to representatives at the CT CDC, the CT Dept of Health, and Governor Rell’s office. No one could or would help us. Since we live on the CT border and are actually residents of NYS, I also tried the NYS CDC, the NYS Dept of Health, and the NYC Dept of Health. They were slightly more helpful, but still could not find us a vaccine. In addition, we could not find a single pediatrician who had the vaccine who was willing to take on a new patient looking for the vaccine.
In the end, a friend new a doctor and told him our story. He had a good heart, and vaccinated my son. We were lucky that I had the time as a SAHM to advocate for my son on a daily basis for a period of weeks, and had friends in the medical profession. In the end, however, it came down to who you know. No state or federal agency prioritized my child, despite his medical history. He fell through the cracks, despite the fact that he is treated by a pediatric pulmonologist (who also couldn’t help us). I can’t help but wonder what happens to other children with respiratory conditions and parents who did not have the luxury of time or connections to insure their children’s health. Who is advocating for them?
from Maggie Fox:
Where scientists go to learn about swine flu
Usually, at a forum on swine flu, all the experts stand up, present a bunch of general background material, a few new findings, and leave. The learning curve on H1N1 is so steep that by the time you fill in the background, you are out of time, and there's no point in hearing the next presenter speak to a general audience
But this week's Institute of Medicine meeting was different. Epidemiologists - the people who specialize in how disease spreads - were talking to molecular geneticists. Keiji Fukuda of the World Health Organization filled in the bench scientists on how negotiating to get vaccines and drugs for poor countries was taking up everyone's valuable time. Veterans of the 1976 swine flu vaccine mess told their stories. Every scientist sat there raptly listening to the other's presentations. Much of the material had not yet gone through the time consuming peer-review process needed for publication in a medical journal, so it was a little raw, but that much more useful and timely to an educated audience.
They traded notes on how technology could make it a lot harder to fight the rumor mill about vaccines and drug side-effects; presented good news about the severity of the pandemic and traded their worries about how the public health system -- or rather the lack of one in the United States and many other countries -- will cope.
CDC pathologist Dr. Sherif Zaki looked at the bodies of patients who died of swine flu and found a surprise -- the virus does not act like regular flu, at least not in seriously ill patients. And more study confirmed that the virus did indeed originally come from pigs.
The consensus is that while many may accuse the public health community and the media of hyping the pandemic, the world is not out of the woods yet, and this virus will continue to surprise the experts for a long time.
from Maggie Fox:
Is swine flu an investment opportunity?
You can prevent swine flu by washing your hands and keeping away from sick people, but how do you make money off of it? Some smaller companies such as Vical and Novavax hope the pandemic might make a short cut for them.
In general vaccines are not lucrative money-makers but this could change.
And then there are always the big antiviral makers. CDC's new guidelines do not offer hope for much more market for them, however. They recommend preserving these drugs for people who really need them.
from Maggie Fox:
Swine flu update
WHO has given up on trying to keep any kind of precise count on swine flu, which is just about everywhere now. It's fairly mild but hardly anyone has any immunity, so it will infect far more people than seasonal flu does in an average year. That may mean more serious cases and more deaths than usual, just by virtue of sheer numbers.
It is affecting lots of kids but there are some clear guidelines for health care workers to protect themselves and their families.
Lots of companies are working on vaccines, which likely will not be ready for most countries until the middle of October. In the meantime, most patients do not need any treatment at all. People with diabetes, asthma, pregnant women and children who seem to have trouble breathing need prompt treatment, however, and the good news is the antiviral drugs still work well.
Swine flu– too many to count
The World Health Organization, which had been patiently publishing every single confirmed case of swine flu, now finally says there are too many too even try counting. This will ease confusion, as the 94,000 confirmed cases were clearly only the tip of the iceberg:
Click here for WHO’s statement.
And while the pandemic is still fairly mild, government are not taking chances — and vaccine makers are feeling the strain
When the going got tough, this school nurse got creative
When her tiny office at a prestigious private school in Queens started to fill up with sick and scared students, nurse Mary Pappas took a deep breath and got inventive. Check out how her on-the-fly responses might help others trying to cope with the swine flu pandemic:
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE5687PY20090709
Meantime keep an eye out for WHO recommendations for vaccinations on Monday:
http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE5692D420090710
We’ll let you know what the likely outcomes are.
Tracking the flu with George Washington
Northwestern professor Dirk Brockmann thinks he can track the spread of H1N1 flu and other future epidemics, thanks in part to the humble $1 bill.
“We’re looking at how people travel in the United States and Europe and trying to find a theory behind human traffic,” Brockmann said. “Then we can unravel the structures within these networks and explain them.”
Modern-day flu epidemics are fueled in part by the ubiquity of global air travel. Local commuting and mobility patterns can be equally important, but more difficult to analyze.
In 2006 Brockmann turned to WheresGeorge.com, a website that tracks dollar bills embossed with unique serial numbers, using money as a proxy for human travel. By calculating the odds that a given dollar bill will stay within a 10 kilometer radius, he created an epidemiological model that can be used to predict the course of the flu outbreak.
Brockmann explains his work on the current H1N1 outbreak in the following video
From Northwestern News on Vimeo.
Has anyone else noticed how completely inaccurate these predictions have been? As of 3 p.m. on May 6, Prof. Brockmann was still projecting only 20-80 cases in the Chicago area by May 14. Yet as of today, there are 102 cases in Chicago and another 59 in Cook County (at least some of which fall under the “Chicago area” heading.
When the outbreak initially occurred, his model predicted no more than 100 cases in the Chicago area by May 30; no more than 30 cases by May 14. AND the model emphasizes that his predictions are worst-case scenarios in which no measures are taken to prevent the spread of the disease.
Hopefully this experience will aid researchers in creating a better model for the prediction of something of this nature.
Mexicans take flu outbreak with dose of skepticism
Mexicans are taking the swine flu outbreak a bit like they do their tequila – seriously, but with a big pinch of salt.
There’s a real fear of catching the killer virus, which has already claimed up to 159 lives, largely because many Mexicans are skeptical about getting the right treatment from state hospitals.
Nothing sums that up better than the millions of surgical face masks being worn by everyone from businessmen to street kids washing car windshields in the capital’s never-ending sprawl.
It’s a bizarre sight, and the rebellious or foolhardy who shun the masks draw suspicious glances.
But even the mask-wearers tell you the whole thing could well be some big nothing cooked up by the media and reminiscent of the mythical beast Chupacabra — Mexico’s bloodsucking equivalent of the Loch Ness monster.
With a shrug and a smile, a lot of Mexicans tell you from behind a strip of grubby fabric that they’ve heard the masks don’t even work.
Taxi drivers, who often show a terrifying disregard for conventional rules of road safety, seem to be taking the mask regime particularly seriously.
Mexican governments have traditionally lied to Mexicans in major crisis, so it’s no wonder that they are taking the epidemic with skepticism. I remember when I used to live there that when an earthquake struck the DF in the late 80′s, the PRI government said that a few hundred people have been killed. However, the U.S. embassy gave a far more realistic figure – it was in the thousands.
I want to clarify a few things since I interviewed Kristine Sheedy at CDC who directs the communication for H1N1 vaccination campaign. 1) vaccination is voluntary not mandatory and not required by schools etc.2) Public opinion polls indicate that despite the shortage of vaccine at local clinics, etc. most people plan to return to get their H1N1 shots once it’s available locally.3) There’s a lot of misinformation regarding the H1N1 vaccine and a good resource is the Myths and Facts on http://www.flu.gov Web site. However, if people are anti-vaccine in general, this information isn’t going to change their mind.Christine Lehmann, MAHealth writer