The Deadly Flu Season
Hey folks,
It it flu season. In like every flu season, people are getting it. Some, die from it. But this year seems to be especially more dangerous. No one seems to know why. I saw on a local news report, that EVERY State, except Florida {Thankfully} seems to be having a epidemic. The problem is, this year, there seems to be more of a strain of the flu that is not effected by the "Flu Shot."According to WPTV Channel 5, the NBC affiliate here in South Florida, U.S. flu season getting worse.
ATLANTA (AP) - Are you feeling surrounded by family, friends and co-workers spewing flu virus? It's not paranoia.
Federal health officials say the flu season is getting worse. And they say it's partly because the vaccine that's out there doesn't protect against more than half of this year's viruses.The flu shot is a good match for only about 40 percent of this year's flu viruses, officials at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday.
That's worse than last week's report when the CDC said the vaccine was protective against roughly half the circulating strains. In good years, the vaccine can fend off 70 to 90 percent.
So what happened in one week?
Infections from an unexpected strain have been booming, and now are the main agent behind most of the nation's lab-confirmed flu cases, said Dr. Joe Bresee, the CDC's chief of influenza epidemiology.
It's too soon to know whether this will prove to be a bad flu season overall, but it's fair to say a lot of people are suffering at the moment. "Every area of the country is experiencing lots of flu right now," Bresee said.
Except Florida, for some reason. Maybe someone should look into that?
This week, 44 states reported widespread flu activity, up from 31 last week. The number children who have died from the flu has risen to 10 since the flu season's official Sept. 30 start.
Those numbers aren't considered alarming. Early February is the time of year when flu cases tend to peak. The 10 pediatric deaths, though tragic, are about the same number as was reported at this time in the last two flu seasons, Bresee said.
The biggest surprise has been how poorly the vaccine has performed.
But wait a second. According to Fox News - Two Children in New York State Die From Influenza, Is an Outbreak Headed to Your City?
All of the drug-resistant viruses are found within the H1N1 strain, one of the three main types of influenza affecting humans this year. Of those strains, 6.7 percent have been found to be resistant to Tamiflu (oseltamivir), an antiviral medication that has been shown to shorten the duration of the flu when taken within two days of infection.
Similar percentages of the drug-resistant strain were also found in Europe and Canada. “Historically, resistance to Tamiflu has been quite rare, less than one percent,” Bresee said. “Now that it’s higher, it’s not a cause for alarm, but we’ve taken notice of it.”
Do we have an outbreak? Do you really have to ask?
Numbers of deaths are hard to pin down for flu season, but the CDC estimates it claims 36,000 lives in the U.S. annually. The last three months of 2007 saw death rates due to flu and pneumonia comparable to the past three years. However, just one week in January 2008 saw an increase to 954 reported deaths from those two infections, which is above the threshold for a major outbreak.
According to Newsday, there may be some good news. FDA changes all 3 strains in 2008-09 flu vaccine
Federal health officials have completed their selection of the three viral strains to be included in next season's flu vaccine, marking the first time in 20 years that they're calling for a complete reformulation of the inoculation.
Vaccine strains are chosen nearly a year in advance because of the long preparation time needed for manufacturing, a laborious process that involves growing the doses in millions of chicken eggs.
Three deactivated viral strains are included in the annual recipe to provide protection against the dominant strains in circulation. Usually, only one or two of those strains are changed each year, but global flu trackers have found that influenza has been particularly widespread this season in the Northern and Southern hemispheres, driven by strains that emerged after the current vaccine was formulated.
"We've enhanced surveillance here and around the world," Dr. Joseph Bresee, chief of the prevention branch in the influenza division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Newsday last week.
CDC epidemiologists and their counterparts from the World Health Organization track global flu prevalence and circulating strains to pinpoint the most likely strains that will cause infection during the next flu season. In this country, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration selects among the offerings - as it did yesterday - the strains to be included in next season's vaccine.
Yesterday, the FDA announced the selection of A-Brisbane/59, A-Brisbane/10 and B-Florida for the 2008-09 flu season. Viruses are named based on their sites of origin.
The three distinct strains that make up the annual vaccine represent two forms of type A influenza, dubbed H1N1 and H3N2, and one form of type B.
This season's flu vaccine has been under a spotlight - and on a hot seat - because its recipe does not include two key circulating strains, A-Brisbane/10 and B-Florida. The mismatch between the strains in circulation and those in the vaccine are being blamed for the substantial rise in flu cases nationwide. Infection levels have remained high since January.
I'm not a Doctor, nor do I even play one on line, but I know there are some preventive drugs out there that some swear by. I'm not naming them for obvious legal reasons, by they are out there. Remember, it is FAR more easy to prevent, than it is to treat. Be careful, be well, and I'll be right back.
Peter
Sources:
WPTV Channel 5 - U.S. flu season getting worse
Fox News- Two Children in New York State Die From Influenza,
Newsday - FDA changes all 3 strains in 2008-09flu vaccine
No comments:
Post a Comment