<p>I remember being out of school for a week with the Hong Kong Flu back in the late 60s. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone! An estimated half a million people caught the HK Flu.</p>
<p>DNA analysis of Mexican outbreak revealed Avian, Swine and Human strains in a never-before seen combination. I believe it is responding to Tamiflu. No one in the US has died. </p>
<p>CDC doesn’t know yet if it will become an epidemic or peter out. </p>
<p>Disease experts: Weigh in, expand, and/or correct!</p>
<p>Too early to draw any firm conclusions yet. My understanding is that the CDC has confirmed that the flu strain responsible for the illnesses and deaths in Mexico City is the same one that has infected some individuals in Texas and California. I don’t believe that any of the individuals in Texas and California were in close proximity with swine, which indicates that human to human transmission of this virus is possible and has already occurred. None of the individuals infected in the U.S. has died. The CDC should soon be able to confirm whether the flu like cases in NYC are related. The new strain seems to be a combination of human, avian and swine viruses. I have heard conflicting reports about whether it is or is not resistant to antiviral drugs. It would be unusual for a flu pandemic to erupt toward the end of the flu season with the arrival of warm weather, but it’s possible.</p>
<p>This past winter was an awful flu season for us. It seemed like there were three or four strains floating around. Two were mild but lasted for a long time and one or two were pretty potent. I’m hoping that this new thing isn’t as potent given the time of year.</p>
<p>Our strategy for the flu is to get lots of rest and to try and keep life on the low side of stress.</p>
<p>Re: the comment on it being unusual for flu epidemics to start in April – I read a history of the 1918 pandemic, and it appears it started with a relatively mild outbreak in the Spring – and returned with a vengeance during the following fall’s flu season. If that were the case here, it would be lucky because it would give sufficient time for a vaccine to be manufactured. Apparently, they do have a “seed” vaccine at CDC and are trying to decide whether conditions warrant actually ramping up production. I believe flu vaccine may still need to be incubated in eggs (although they may have moved beyond this), but it would be a time consuming process to grow, purify, and test enough vaccine to inoculate most of the population. Also, I’m certain powers-that-be at CDC remember well the debacle of swim flu vaccine 20 or so years ago, where they did a mass inoculation for what turned out to be a false alarm, with a number of folks developing Gullain-Barre syndrome as a side effect. In a sense, it’s an incredibly difficult decision to make, with high likelihood of blame either way.</p>
<p>Re: what to do? I believe Michael Osterholm, a flu expert was quoted today as saying the trying to close borders to contain the outbreak would be a political move rather than a medical one, because it is already present in the US and shown to spread human-to-human. With air travel the way it is today, it’s likely it’s reached other contenents as well.</p>
<p>Of course, crowd control ideas should it become an epidemic would be a great idea-closing schools, movie theaters, etc. Probably using masks to at least avoid droplet spread (and protect others if one is infected) would also be good, along with handwashing. The strain, thus far, appears to be sensitive to both Tamiflu and Relenza – and the government does have some stockpiles, although not enough to treat everyone. I would suppose a plan is in place for to whom it gets distributed (e.g. emergency response personnel, health care personnel, etc) given limited supplies.</p>
<p>Remember – even in the 1918 pandemic, mortality was pretty low (I believe only about 3%) – it’s just that flu is so contagious that this relatively low mortality translated into millions of people. Also, it impacted young adults which made the outcome particularly tragic. </p>
<p>Over the next week or so I think we’ll have a better idea as to whether this is a false alarm or the real thing – but the real thing is coming sooner or later…</p>
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Over the next week or so I think we’ll have a better idea as to whether this is a false alarm or the real thing – but the real thing is coming sooner or later…
<p>The Kansas Department of Health is now reporting two confirmed cases of swine flu in that state. Swine flu has not been ruled out in the case of the 75 students sickened in NYC, but the test results still aren’t in yet.</p>
<p>Lets be mellow - I still have my rolls of plastic sheeting that the government asked us to keep on hand to put over our windows to keep the poison gas out after 9-11, the gloves and masks left over from the avian flu due to arrive from China in 19__ , and less we forget - the bomb shelters from the 60’s.
No doubt educated people should keep themselves up to date on current events and concerns but please lets follow events and not declare that the sky is falling. </p>
<p>PS - am I the only one who remembers that 2 members of the Bush cabinet made tens of Millions in stock gains from the governments decision to purchase large supplies of Tamiflu at the time of the reported China scare . I’ll follow the new story but - Often the story behind the panic has a bigger impact on our lives…</p>
<p>Allow me to lighten the tone here with a conversation I had with my daughter tonight as I was making dinner, one which made me wonder how she got accepted by any college at all:</p>
<p>D: There’s no pork in that, is there?</p>
<p>Me: In turkey burgers? Of course not. Why would you ask me that?</p>
<p>D: Well, I just wanted to make sure–there’s none, right?</p>
<p>Me: Right, none–but why are you asking?</p>
<p>D: Well, you know all about it, right?</p>
<p>Me: About what?</p>
<p>D: That swine flu thing.</p>
<p>Luckily for humankind, she’s not planning on med school!</p>
<p>I can relate, Kelowna!
D2 (11) had a really horrible flu a few weeks ago - Peaked with 104 fever, cold,sore throat, cough, bloody noses, even some vomiting. It was just awful, and almost brought to mind some sort of plague. Each morning she’d be better, fever gone, and it would come back again by bedtime. The nurse at the pediatrician’s office said they were seeing a lot of similar cases, minus the nosebleed. If it had happened now, with this flu in the news, I’d probably be quite worried. Her sister got it as well, but more just an upper respiratory version. She has yet to kick it completely, though, and both girls seem much weaker and worse for wear after it finally ran it’s course.</p>
<p>What preventive things do other CC’ers do to keep their immune systems healthy? I take (and eat) garlic, drink a lot of OJ, and sometimes take Airborne (which is purported to be useless, but in my case I swear there’s a placebo effect). Main thing with the older kids is making sure they get enough sleep. S1 had mono this past fall, and I swear has never completely recovered. Never missed a day of school due to illness, but since then he’s had colds, strep, bronchitis-- one thing after another.</p>
<p>Sleep. A little humidity (shouldn’t be a problem with the warmer weather). Maybe less time at the gym (gyms are notorious for passing stuff around) and maybe working from home a day or two per week. There’s no way to avoid people on a college campus but the semester is over soon.</p>