March 4th Flu Update
A woman who was suspected to be Laos' second human case has died.ProMed on Laos...
Flu awareness is promoted in Nigeria.
Myanmar says other dead birds did not have bird flu.
In the Middle East, a Cooperation Committee is meeting to review recent developments in Kuwait.
Two more birds have H5N1 in Kuwait.
ProMed on Kuwait, new cases in Pakistan, and Malaysia says it will cull, not vaccinate.
ProMed with a good post on China. Note first the new case reported yesterday. Also, note that yesterday we ran a story about a flu survivor donating his serum to the sick woman. Here is what the mod says:
The use of human convalescent serum, possibly from an immunologically unmatched source, is a novel and risky approach in the treatment of avian influenza. Further information is awaited regarding the outcome of this treatment and whether other more conventional approaches such as the use of anti-neuraminidase drugs have been used.
Effect Measure calls for a true epidemiological study of bird flu.
A large and systematic seroprevalence survey (i.e., looking for blood antibody evidence of past infection) in Vietnam might answer some of these questions. Results showing little or no evidence of undiagnosed past infection might not settle all the questions, but it would lessen some of the nagging doubt that all is well in Vietnam. Comparison with Thailand where mass culling has been the main control technique and in Laos and Cambodia where little effective control of any kind exists would be instructive.
Hong Kong researcher has high hopes for his bird flu vaccine.
Senior Citizen pub says (with some self-satisfaction), that the kids will get the bird flu worse than their grandparents (but the world is still going to hell in a handbasket)
posted by Orange @ 9:28 PM
1 Comments:
Orange;
Even though as Revere suggests, a “true epidemiological study” of bird flu would be beneficial, the chances of this happening in our lifetime, are about the same odds as me winning the multi-state 340M Mega-Millions Lotto this Tuesday.
My own opinion is that if a seroprevalence study were to be conducted in Laos, Myanmar, China, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and Vietnam, we may not want to know the results, because it may finally validate the magnitude of the under-reporting and misreporting, that has been prevalent over the last 3 years. I think we would all be astounded.
During this slow news period, I had an opportunity to poke around a bit on the news services. It is truly amazing the number of unofficial suspected H5N1suspect patients from the country sides being reported by the local Indonesian hospitals, that keep pouring in for treatment, still.
There is no way the Indonesian army or the government there can keep the H5N1 virus under control – maybe the Chinese army who can field over one million members, might have a chance.
Yes, Orange, the Senior Citizen pub is correct in one respect – the world may, as far as H5N1 is concerned, be going to hell in a hand basket. Pretty soon, the method of trial and error, that the H5N1 virus is performing so efficiently in order to mutate human to human, will come to an end, and we will all know the end of the story… or the beginning, as the case may be.
I think it would be wise to not only watch the general world news reports closely from now on, but also start watching the world financial reports for peculiarities. Since the vast majority of outbreaks in both birds and humans have occurred in the Asia and China area, I believe it would be most prudent to watch for panic in those financial markets first, since the money managers will react at lightning speed to move their money out of those areas quickly.
That will be one of my first main indicators that propels me into final preparation action.
Provided I don’t win the MegaMillions jackpot on Tuesday – then, it’s a different ballgame altogether as far as my pandemic preparations go.
No more stacks of twinkies and ho ho’s for this guy, I’ll go first class and maybe even move to one of those extremely well prepared countries, like Switzerland where they already are storing pre-pandemic vaccines for their citizen (and rich people).
Wulfgang
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