Re: H1N1 FLU BREAKING NEWS: Cases reach 2,500

[Guest guest]

There was an article I read linked from Yahoo! stating that possible projections

over the next 2 years could have up to 2 billion of the earth's population

having contracted some variation of the flu, with most having it be so minor

that they don't even realize they have it. This is what I think they concluded

as a worst-case scenario, based on their best guesses for travel/distribution of

it, and past pandemics.

I'm wondering about this detail: if it combines with current more typical

versions of the flu that already exist (not the bird flu, but the more typical

human-contracted ones) will it become milder or more severe for symptoms,

virulence, and mortality rate?

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> Read the part in RED please.

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> Administrator

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> http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/content/influenza/swineflu/news/may0809\

> breaknews.html

> <http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/content/influenza/swineflu/news/may080\

> 9breaknews.html>

>

> H1N1 FLU BREAKING NEWS: Cases reach 2,500, Mexico's severe cases,

> concern about viral mixing, holding at phase 5

>

> May 8, 2009

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> The World Health Organization (WHO) listed a global total of 2,500

> confirmed cases of swine influenza H1N1 in 25 countries today. That

> total included 1,204 cases in Mexico, 896 cases in the United States

> (yesterday's number), 214 in Canada, 88 in Spain, and 34 in the United

> Kingdom. The death toll remains at 44, including 42 in Mexico and 2 in

> the United States.

>

> The US swine flu case count jumped to 1,639 confirmed cases in 43 states

> as of this morning, an increase of 743 from yesterday's total of 896

> cases, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

> (CDC). The death toll remains at 2. Illinois had the most cases with

> 392, followed by Wisconsin, 240, New York, 174, Alabama, 131, and

> California, 107. At a news briefing, CDC Director Dr. Besser

> said 57 US patients—3.5% of the total—were hospitalized. He said

> the nation has about another 850 probable cases.

>

> WHO experts held a conference call yesterday with Mexican officials to

> discuss clinical findings in the patients who died from severe swine flu

> infections, Sylvie d, acting director of the WHO's Global Influenza

> Program, said today at a media briefing. Mexican health officials have

> identified two high-risk groups: previously healthy young people who

> deteriorated rapidly with acute pneumonia and people with chronic health

> conditions such as cardiovascular disease or tuberculosis. d said

> viral pneumonia has played a role in the deaths, but bacterial pneumonia

> has been less of a factor, unlike in other pandemics. Authorities have

> found that causes of death are typically respiratory failure or organ

> failure.

>

> A leading flu expert is worried that the swine flu virus could combine

> with the H5N1 avian flu virus to produce a new, highly contagious and

> lethal strain, the Associated Press (AP) reported today. " My great worry

> is that when this H1N1 virus gets into the epicenters for H5N1 in

> Indonesia, Egypt and China, we may have real problems, " virologist

> Webster told the AP. Malik Peiris, a flu expert at Hong Kong

> University, said the more immediate concern is that the swine flu virus

> could mix with regular flu viruses.

>

> The WHO still has found no evidence of community transmission of the

> swine flu virus outside North America, which would trigger the move from

> a pandemic phase 5 to phase 6, Sylvie d, a WHO influenza expert,

> told reporters today. Most new cases outside North America represent

> imported infections linked to travel or infections in travelers' close

> contacts.

>

[Guest guest]

" I'm wondering about this detail: if it combines with current more typical

versions of the flu that already exist (not the bird flu, but the more typical

human-contracted ones) will it become milder or more severe for symptoms,

virulence, and mortality rate? "

Mortality is going to increase whether or not it combines with a more virulant

strain, or whether or not the existing strain stays the same.

The problem with this flu is NOT that it's mild, but that it spreads so fast.

When it hits people with already weakened immune status, like those with HIV or

cancer or what have you, those people will get very sick very fast and flood the

hospitals, thereby preventing doctors from being able to provide the high level

of service they would otherwise be able to provide.

Further, a lot of people that would normally receive treatment would be turned

back, and many of them will die.

This flu will not be around for decades. Like existing strains, it will make the

rounds in a year and then fizzle out, or mutate into a less virulant form once

society has either endured it or developed an immunity to it.

Try to imagine 1 out of every three people you know getting sick with many of

them going to the hospital. Could you imagine the mortality from it, aside from

the economic death so much of society would undergo?

Administrator