The Coming Influenza Pandemic?

December 14 Flu Update--nearly 7 Billion birds in China vaccinated.

He developed symptoms of fever, cough and breathing difficulty on 6 November, was hospitalized on 9 November, and died on 19 November.

Family members and close contacts were placed under observation and tested for possible infection. No evidence of additional cases has been detected.

Investigations have been undertaken to determine the source of the man’s exposure. While he did not keep poultry in his household, chickens and other birds were found in his neighbourhood. Samples from these birds have been taken and are undergoing tests to determine whether they may have been the source of infection.

The general theme of the half-day conference was that much, if not most, of the real work of preparing for a pandemic must be done at the local and state levels.

An audience that nearly packed the auditorium at the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul heard that pandemic preparedness consists of much more than a plan on paper or an intention to stockpile antiviral drugs.

"Hope is not a plan," said Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Health and Human Services (HHS ) Secretary Michael O. Leavitt said, "A plan represents our aspiration; being prepared is what we've demonstrated in the context of an exercise."

Minnesota only has 10 percent of the hospital beds it would need if a flu pandemic broke out and has nowhere near enough drugs or ventilators to treat the sickest patients, Minnesota Commissioner of Health Dianne Mandernach said on Wednesday. And her state is being praised as one of the most prepared for a pandemic or other emergency.

Health workers arrived 30 minutes after Qin Zhijun reported finding dead chickens. Within 11 hours, tests confirmed it was bird flu and his flock of 7,000 birds was destroyed.

Then China's normally slow, secretive government did something even more unusual. Instead of imposing an information blackout, it flew foreign reporters to the northern region of Inner Mongolia to meet Qin and see his farm.

RNA interference, or RNAi, is a naturally occurring mechanism within cells for selectively silencing and regulating specific genes. Since many diseases are caused by the inappropriate activity of specific genes, the ability to silence genes selectively through RNAi could provide a new way to treat a wide range of human diseases. RNAi is induced by small, double-stranded RNA molecules. One method to activate RNAi is with chemically synthesized small interfering RNAs, or siRNAs, which are double-stranded RNAs that are targeted to a specific disease-associated gene. The siRNA molecules are used by the natural RNAi machinery in cells to cause highly targeted gene silencing.

posted by Orange @ 3:52 PM