How do you spin facts like this? We had one school closed this morning and now 5. One case was known this morning and now 9. That is pretty damn fast.
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H1N1 ("Swine") Flu
- Thread starter Cave Man
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How do you spin facts like this? We had one school closed this morning and now 5. One case was known this morning and now 9. That is pretty damn fast.
When you think about how many people these kids came into contact with, it's scary. It's a private school and kids take public buses from there to all points over the county (Queens). Some live on Long Island who have caught it.
The treatment for the overwhelming majority of people who contract this particular flu will be no different from any other flu. Rest and plenty of fluids.
The problem is with your question. There is no real "in the know" for this because most of the variables that need to be filled are not yet known or have a high degree of uncertainty. The public is operating with a dearth of information. On the flip side of the coin, I don't envy the guys who are working on investigation and control on this one because the moment that people and governments started hitting the panic button, those guys went into total information overload. It's hard enough trying to develop a proper epi model when the information case is ideal, much less when the people you're interviewing can't tell the difference between reality and their own speculation.
Already, you have people taking advantage of the panic to push their own agendas. The Egyptian government has ordered the slaughtering of all pigs in the country. This hurts only the religious minority that are already discriminated against. The Egyptian government's reaction makes almost no sense scientifically, because it's not pigs that are spreading the disease, it's people. In fact, at this time, there's no definite indication that pigs are the reservoir.
If we sat here and made a list of the major relevant factors that would influence decision making in terms of containment and control, the unknowns heavily outweigh the knowns. Of course, this is usually the way it is anyway because it's very difficult to tell where on the epidemiological curve you are before you are already past the peak. There are methods to help you predict this, but if anyone tries to tell you that they know how any novel virus will behave, they're blowing smoke up your ass.
Just to give you an idea, how many people were exposed? How many of those exposed were infected? What's the contact time for infection? How many of those developed symptoms? How many of those who were symptomatic became seriously ill? How many of those died? These are just a small fraction of the bare minimum needed to establish any kind of scientific grasp of the situation and the fact of the matter is, most of it's either unknown or estimates vary widely.
There's actually quite a bit more known virologically and that helps in a number of ways. Unfortunately, flu viruses are notoriously unpredictable and have been known to change very, very quickly. There's a lot that makes this both a very heavy factor or a non factor, depending on which perspective you take. Health personnel who directly treat patients will often have a very different take than a person trying to prevent the spread of a disease.
Even this idea that there seems to be a very different pattern in Mexico vs the rest of the world might be flawed. It could be that the pattern IS very different. Or it could be that so many people were infected and had such mild symptoms that they never sought medical care or told anyone. These are things that will not be established with any degree of certainty for quite some time to come.
So yeah, there's a reason you're reading the same five stories over and over. Because there's not that much in the way of facts to report. Speculation, on the other hand, is easy to sell.
The reasoning may be specious, but the renaming may not be a bad idea. Calling it the swine flu gives the impression that pigs are somehow involved in the transmission process, which is very far from the truth indeed. It's long past the point where pigs matter, if ever they did.
It's common practice, OTOH, to name diseases and viruses for the region of the world where it became transmissable from human to human. West Nile, Hanta, Ebola, etc, are named for specific places.
*facepalm*
Pigs passed it back and forth, and to humans for years... That's where it came from... Its just a slightly mutated strain that allows infection from human to human.
I'm sure I read somewhere this morning/last night that the Mexican government was saying something about how it hadn't necessarily originated in Mexico so I doubt calling it Mexican Flu would cheer them all that much.
Thanks for the reply Signal-11.
Thanks for the reply Signal-11.
let's just hope it doesn't get to China or India. Even if the mortaility rate is as low as 1 in 1000, in such population centers there could easily be deaths in the 1000s.
The problem will be widespread use of Tamiflu and Relenza and the subsequent emergence of resistant variants next fall.
The problem will be widespread use of Tamiflu and Relenza and the subsequent emergence of resistant variants next fall.
Well, it's still a fast evolving situation with TONS of unknowns, and I'm not sure that there is a "in the know" group. Essentially, if you get this flu - keep hydrated, stay home and rest, and let your immune system to try battle it out. This seems to be the approach for the US cases, and they're doing okay on their own. But, for those who need a bit more help, there are the anti-viral medications like Tamiflu, which works as follows:
Neuraminidase is a critical enzyme/surface protein that allows the flu virus to bud from one infected host cell to go on and infect another one, especially in the respiratory tract. Tamiflu works by binding the neuraminidase so that the newly formed virus particles in the infected cell are unable to bud and thus, unable to spread and infect other cells.
But, really, we don't have any idea of what this strain will do. Flu viruses are really dynamic and can change rather quickly. What we know about the virus today could change tomorrow.
Beaten to it!
Ebola Zaire, Ebola Sudan, Ebola Reston, etc.
Mexican Influenza seems to make sense with the traditional naming conventions.
The CDC has been refraining from saying that the deaths were caused by cytokine storm with this one.
The 1918 one, yes, they believe cytokine storm was responsible for the deaths, but for this one, they've been hesitant to blame a hyper immune response. Could be for the young adults in Mexico, but they're not saying.
There was a point where they were thinking it was (due to the age group affected), but that's changed it seems.
EDIT:
The official stance is "insufficient information to date" regarding such complications.
http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/identifyingpatients.htm
This is what I meant by my post about why I decline from commenting. You, as it says on your profile, are a nurse. Is the exact origin and point of mutation something that you know for certain? Is that your professional opinion or knowledge that you have with a high degree of certainty?
Because here's what I know. I know that I don't know.
But since it seems that you DO know, please enlighten us about where pigs fit into the chain of transmission of this particular strain. Please tell us how you know for certain that this particular genome cocktail took place in a pig and not a bird.
If you know, that's great. If you don't, please keep your *facepalms* to yourself.
There's a specific reason I used the language I did in the line that you quoted. Read the qualifiers again. I have a feeling that this is more about reading comprehension than anything else.
will take a few more days to get complete sequence of multiple isolates at > 2x coverage.
most likely a single point mutation allowing for enhanced binding to human receptors. Nothing drastic is needed, as it is already mammalian-adapted, unlike avian influenza.
It is not my job, nor curiosity to understand the exact science of cell mutation etc. But I know enough to understand that influenza is a dynamically mutating virus that has potential to merge with other strains of similar types. The likes of which your body would not recognize as foreign until far too late in the infection process. I also understand the methods of disease transmission and my job as a nurse is educating people how to keep themselves safe.
Well when you said "if they ever did [matter]" it seemed as though you were insinuating pigs did not contribute to this strain at all. I'm sorry if I misunderstood.
As someone else posted, early reports have suggested a cross-mutation between Avian, Swine, and Human strains.
Well when you said "if they ever did [matter]" it seemed as though you were insinuating pigs did not contribute to this strain at all. I'm sorry if I misunderstood.
As someone else posted, early reports have suggested a cross-mutation between Avian, Swine, and Human strains.