The past few weeks have received little mainstream media coverage on the swine flu pandemic currently sweeping the globe apart from minor reports on cases here and there. In a new twist to the whole outbreak news agencies across the globe are now reporting on the US having over 1 million cases of swine flu!
From Kaiser Health News:
The Associated Press/Washington Post reported that U.S. health officials on Thursday said they believe as many as 1 million Americans have been infected with H1N1 and “6 percent or more of some urban populations are infected.” The estimates were based upon survey data collected by health officials and mathematical modeling.
The article also notes that “as many as 60 million doses of vaccine to protect against the new virus could be ready by September, said Robin Robinson, an official with the federal agency that oversees vaccine manufacture and distribution.” But others at the meeting said “that prediction seemed a bit optimistic” (Stobbe, 6/26).
According to the Los Angeles Times, Lyn Finelli, a flu surveillance official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told members of a vaccine advisory committee that while there are nearly 28,000 laboratory-confirmed U.S. cases of the virus have been reported to the CDC, “standard models of viral spread indicate that many times that number have been infected.” The seasonal flu typically infects between 15 million to 60 million Americans annually. By this time of year, “[t]he normal seasonal flu virus has virtually disappeared from this country, as would be expected. But the novel H1N1 virus is continuing to spread, and now accounts for 98% of all cases” (Los Angeles Times, 6/25).
From Webmd.com:
Most swine flu hospitalizations are among people with underlying medical conditions:
32% have asthma or chronic lung disease
16% have diabetes
10% are current smokers
7% are pregnant
An analysis of 99 of the 127 U.S. residents who have died of swine flu shows that 87 of them suffered underlying conditions:11% had asthma
24% had other lung diseases
13% had diabetes
11% were morbidly obese
34% were obese
The CDC is currently investigating the emergence of obesity as a risk factor for severe swine flu.
From NY Times:
That total of those who have already been infected is “just a ballpark figure,” said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of respiratory diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, adding, “We know we’re not tracking every single one of them.”
Only a tiny fraction of those million cases have been tested, Dr. Schuchat said. The estimate is based on testing plus telephone surveys in New York City and several other locales where the new flu has hit hard.
A survey in New York City, she said, showed that almost 7 percent of those called had had flu symptoms during just three weeks in May when the flu was spreading rapidly through schools. If that percentage of the city has had it, then there have been more than 500,000 cases in the city alone, though most have been mild enough that doctors recommended nothing more than rest and fluids.
So why the sudden jump in figures?
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