February 4 Flu Update
WHO labs have reported four new cases of bird flu in Indonesia, including two deaths.For the time being, the flu crisis in Turkey is over. The final four flu patients were released from the hospital. Two children released were in the hospital for a month and had once been in critical condition.
There are more dead swans in Bulgaria, and testing goes on. So far only H5 has been confirmed.
Recombinomics on Bulgaria, and the ongoing belief that any country in this region not reporting outbreaks is underreporting.
Russia says there is no bird flu in Russia.
An official in Britain writes that the country should tackle basic inequality within the health system and stop frittering away time on things like bird flu.
There's no need to upgrade anti-bird flu measures in Macau.
FYI, here is info on Macau.
From Canada, notice is taken that while the pandemic plan calls for prophalytic use of Tamiflu, especially for healthcare workers, there isn't going to be enough to go around. Note for those scoring at home...the article says Canada has the highest per capita stockpile of Tamiflu in the world.
WHO says that bird flu is a pandemic in birds, but unlikely to break among humans soon."If we wanted to stockpile for 35 per cent, we don't have enough, and we're continuing to work on what the actual numbers should be and calculating the resources that would be required to add to the reserve," said Dr. Paul Gully, a deputy chief public health officer at the Public Health Agency of Canada.
And "if we wanted to use antivirals for prophylaxes of health-care workers in direct contact with sick individuals . . . again, we would not have sufficient" amounts.
ProMed reports from various countries. A couple notes. There are some deads birds in Georgia, which hasn't been reported anywhere else recently, and there was a new outbreak in birds in Turkey, which leads us to watch for more human cases.
[1] Hong Kong
[2] Bulgaria: swan, suspected
[3] Georgia (Ajariya): ducks, preliminary suspected
[4] Turkey - east
[5] FAO update (multicountry)
Iraq has reported to the OIE--bird flu is being found there in birds.
Crofsblog had this on Vietnam being bird flu vaccine from China. Note his comments on what the US and Canada could learn from Vietnam.
On a slow news day, I will leave you with something to ponder from Recombinomics. Niman writes that today a majority of bird flu cases in humans are H2H. Read for yourself, decide for yourself.
posted by Orange @ 10:51 PM
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