Posted on 06/24/2009 8:04:24 AM PDT by metmom
Within minutes, six-year-old Rubjit Thindal went from happily chatting in the back seat of the car to collapsing and dying in her father's arms.
"If we had known it was so serious, we would have called 911,'' Kuldip Thindal, Rubjit's distraught mother, said in Punjabi yesterday. "She just had a stomach ache -- she wasn't even crying.''
Rubjit was pronounced dead at hospital barely 24 hours after showing signs of a fever. Later, doctors told her parents she had the H1N1 influenza virus. She is believed to be the youngest person in Canada with the virus to have died.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.guelphmercury.com ...
I usually get 'sick" run a fever and sleep for 12 hours get up and am fine. This time it was a very bad 3 days and 7 days later I am just getting my energy back.
My doc informed me that in NM the emergency rooms and ICU are full half with people who had underlying conditions but the other half...
People like me who rarely get sick, the crazy thing is those of us who normally fight off sickness are the sickist.
He is in his late 70's and it is the "darnest" thing he has ever seen.
Just FYI
Thanks , for the ground report I appreciate your post .
I’m glad your feeling better now .
If you want to be added to the avian / h1n1 flu freeper ping list please let me know .
I thought this article below was very interesting .....
(( Exercise & the Flu ))
October 14, 2009 , 12:01 am
Phys Ed: Does Exercise Boost Immunity?
By Gretchen Reynolds
Marc Romanelli/Getty Images
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/14/phys-ed-does-exercise-boost-immunity/?em
Two recent experiments hit rather close to home at this time of year. In the first, published last year in the journal Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, researchers divided mice into two groups. One rested comfortably in their cages. The other ran on little treadmills until they were exhausted. This continued for three days. The mice were then exposed to an influenza virus. After a few days, more of the mice who’d exhausted themselves running came down with the flu than the control mice. They also had more severe symptoms.
CA:
(( More info on child H1N1 Death in which H1N1 Flu caused her heart to stop working ))
Child’s death a flu mystery
Otherwise healthy Otay girl didn’t have unusual symptoms
By Keith Darcé
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
2:00 a.m. October 16, 2009
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/oct/16/childs-death-flu-mystery/
Alitza Ortiz Sanchez didn’t have a high fever, cough, runny nose or sore throat.
That’s why her parents, who live in Otay Mesa, didn’t suspect swine flu when they first brought their sick 5-year-old daughter to a physician on the morning of Oct. 8.
But when the girl developed a terrible headache and purplish swelling around her eyes the next day, her parents knew something was wrong. Alitza was dead 35 hours later, becoming the first child in San Diego County to succumb to the H1N1 influenza virus.
Last night, mother Itzya Sanchez and father Miguel Ortiz joined family members at a funeral home near Tijuana’s City Hall for a wake. Inside the coffin, Alitza wore a red princess dress modeled after an outfit in the Disney movie “Beauty and the Beast.”
“For Halloween, she wanted to be a princess, so we bought her a new one” for the funeral, Sanchez said. “We didn’t think something like this could happen to us.”
Alitza’s fate, which her family detailed yesterday, puzzled local medical experts and made parents fear their children might now be more vulnerable to the disease.
“I was terrified,” said Brandi Ware, as she walked her kindergartener, Mikalia, and her first-grader, Mikiah, yesterday morning to Howard Pence Elementary School, where Alitza attended kindergarten. “I’m planning to go get the vaccinations as soon as possible.”
Swine flu vaccine shots and nasal sprays are starting to arrive in the county, but supplies will remain limited for several weeks.
Dr. John Bradley, director of the infectious-disease division at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego, tried to offer reassurance yesterday. He said Alitza’s case was highly unusual and that most people who contract swine flu suffer only mild symptoms and recover in a few days.
Still, Alitza’s death offered a tragic warning.
“It reminds us that even common viruses like influenza” should be taken seriously, Bradley said. “Common viruses can cause death, and we don’t like to think about that.”
For months, epidemiologists have known that younger patients are more likely than adults to be hospitalized or killed by swine flu.
Nearly half of the 272 patients receiving hospital treatment for the virus from April to mid-June in the United States were under 18 years old, according to an article published by The New England Journal of Medicine last week.
A separate study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that children and teenagers accounted for about 8 percent of swine flu deaths in the country.
While two-thirds of those victims had serious underlying health problems, such as nervous-system disorders and chronic lung disease, the rest were otherwise healthy.
Swine flu deaths among children have continued to climb in recent weeks with the start of the new school year. CDC officials listed Alitza as the 82nd juvenile fatality from the disease in the United States.
Alitza’s illness struck near the end of a two-week school break.
“Her dad had just taught her how to swim without her life vest,” said the girl’s aunt, Melina Hernandez. “She loved playing dress-up, putting on those press-on nails. She was just the happiest little girl.”
Sanchez, 29, is a homemaker, and Ortiz, 24, works as an auto detailer. They live in an apartment with two other children.
The family resided for a while in Tijuana but moved back to San Diego about seven months ago.
Alitza’s parents initially took her to a physician in Tijuana because they lack health insurance, the family said.
After a urine test indicated a possible urinary tract infection, the doctor prescribed a medication and told them to return the next day.
Alitza slept well that night, her mother said, but in the morning she vomited after eating soup. “We just thought it was the medicine having a reaction,” Sanchez said.
By the time they arrived at the doctor’s office for the follow-up visit, Alitza’s heart was racing. Troubled by the development, the physician sent the family back across the border to Rady Children’s Hospital.
Border agents recognized the health emergency and let them cross without waiting in line.
Sanchez and Ortiz arrived at the emergency room early in the evening last Friday. The staff took Alitza to a small room where she was given an IV and connected to a heart monitor.
Before long, she was having severe stomach pain. “She was yelling and crying,” Sanchez said.
Minutes later, Alitza’s heart stopped beating.
Doctors were able to resuscitate Alitza. Then they rushed her to the intensive-care unit, but her heart continued to fail. She was pronounced dead around 1 a.m. Saturday.
It could be weeks before physicians know exactly what killed Alitza, but they already have several theories.
They know the H1N1 virus had infiltrated the girl’s cardiac muscles because enzymes that normally reside inside heart cells were flowing through her blood, a sure sign of significant tissue damage, Bradley said.
While it’s common for influenza to infect muscles — that’s why the flu often causes body aches — the virus rarely spreads to the heart. When it does, the result can be swift and deadly.
The infection can interfere with the heart’s specialized cells, which conduct electricity and orchestrate the organ’s pumping action, Bradley said. “If you don’t have a coordinated contraction, blood doesn’t pump out,” he said.
Another possibility is encephalitis, or brain swelling caused by infection. The headaches that tormented Alitza could be a signal of this condition.
“We look for hallucinations, for a child who doesn’t recognize the people around her or sees things crawling on the walls,” Bradley said.
To solve the mystery, Bradley and other doctors will examine organ samples taken from Alitza’s body and pore over the large amount of information gathered during her care.
Bradley said he’s certain of one thing: Sanchez and Ortiz couldn’t have done anything more to save their little girl’s life.
“The parents did everything right in this case,” he said.
Union-Tribune
Keith Darcé: (619) 293-1020
VT:
Absences increase at Burlington school
By Molly Walsh • Free Press Staff Writer • October 16, 2009
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20091016/NEWS02/910160310/1007
The principal of Champlain Elementary School in Burlington urged parents Thursday to keep students home if they have a fever or other signs of illness to help curtail a spike in illnesses at the school that could be H1N1, or swine flu.
At least one student has been diagnosed with H1N1, and 32 students, comprising 10 percent of the student body, were absent Thursday — a figure well above the typical rate of absences.
An unusual number of students at the South End school this week have visited the school nurse with symptoms that are consistent with swine flu, including fever, sore throat, cough and exhaustion. The district’s other five elementary schools do not appear to be experiencing the same level of absences. They reported between one and five students out for flu-like symptoms Thursday, according to school officials.
There have been no hospitalizations thus far of Champlain students, they said.
Champlain principal Leslie Colomb asked parents in an Alert Now telephone message to help prevent the spread of the flu by keeping any student with a fever of 100 degrees or higher at home and monitoring children daily for sore throat and cough. Parents are advised to keep ill children home for at least 24 hours after any treatment.
For now, the school will remain open, Burlington School Superintendent Jeanne Collins said. “We will continue to monitor this illness and to provide parents with as much information as we can. We prefer not to close school unless we do not have staff to operate. Too many of our kids need access to a stable, secure environment during the day with meals, and to close school prematurely would not be good for the students or their families.”
Teachers and staff have not been absent in high numbers at Champlain, district administrators said Thursday.
Champlain is scheduled to host in-school H1N1 vaccination clinics for students in partnership with the Vermont Health Department on Oct. 26 and Dec. 2. The vaccinations are optional, free and can be given only with parents’ consent. For more information visit www.bsdvt.org
UK:
Swine Flu: Vaccination to begin ‘within a week’
By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent
Published: 8:30AM BST 16 Oct 2009
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/swine-flu/6341785/Swine-Flu-Vaccination-to-begin-within-a-week.html
Two women who contracted swine flu while pregnant have died in the past week, as the death toll from the virus passed 100.
The news came as it was announced that a mass vaccination will begin within days.
Swine flu cases in Del. rise sharply
110 new victims confirmed last week; hospital sees record number of kids
October 16, 2009
By HIRAN RATNAYAKE
The News Journal
http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20091016/HEALTH/910160371/1006/NEWS
A Wilmington school closes. A Rockland emergency room treats a one-day record number of children. And the number of confirmed cases keeps climbing.
Barely two weeks into flu season, the number of confirmed cases of swine flu nearly tripled from one week to the next, according to Delaware public health officials. And four people became the first in the state to be hospitalized with the virus since the season began Oct. 4.
“We are clearly seeing an increase and next week we could continue to see even more confirmed cases and even more reports of influenza-like illness,” said Dr. Karyl Rattay, director of the state public health division.
She was referring to the state’s most recent report that showed 179 lab-confirmed cases of swine — or H1N1 — flu during the week of Oct. 4 to 10. That’s 110 more confirmed cases than the week before.
Public health officials also said there were 131 new reports of influenza-like illnesses from the 20 primary care doctors asked by the state to submit their observations each week.
The virus caused a record number of children to visit Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Rockland on Sunday. On Wednesday, the Kuumba Academy Charter School became the first Delaware school this academic year to close because of swine flu.
Only a fraction of the 520,000 doses of swine flu vaccine allocated for Delaware have arrived, even as some school districts began alerting parents they can have their children vaccinated in school.
Public health officials said 32,900 doses of injectable swine flu vaccine and 5,769 doses of the nasal spray known as FluMist were expected to arrive next week. Those doses would be for family physicians and pediatricians to make available to children.
Four of the five children of Carol Dowder of Port Penn are considered more susceptible to swine flu because they are 24 or younger. She also is concerned about her 8-month-old granddaughter.
“With swine flu, you hear that it’s killing more kids,” she said. “I’m hearing about it every day and noticing that a lot more people are getting sick.”
There have been no reports of swine flu-related deaths in Delaware.
However, three of the four people who were hospitalized in the state were children — ages 11 months, 11 years and 12 years. The other person was 44. All four have recovered, Rattay said.
“That’s a big jump from 69 to 179,” said Dr. Hugh Bonner, a primary care physician at Wilmington’s St. Francis Hospital, of the lab-confirmed cases. “It’s pretty frightening and I’ll be interested to see what happens over the next month or so.”
A lot could depend on how much vaccine starts arriving in Delaware.
The state will get about 54,000 doses by the end of October, less than half of the 110,000 it expected a month ago.
‘Production issues’
Rattay said the drop is because of “production issues” with manufacturers, who are turning out vaccine supplies that are 30 percent to 40 percent of the normal amount.
Yet, Rattay said, she is certain the swine flu vaccine will be ready for school-age children next month. Clinics at schools will begin in early November and run for four to six weeks.
“We’re really focusing a lot of public health nurses on this [school] campaign,” she said.
A news release issued Thursday by Indian River School District said the public health division would be scheduling swine flu vaccination clinics there beginning the week of Nov. 2. Rattay said that is not the case.
Dave Maull, Indian River School District spokesman, said the district was told by the public health division that the week of Nov. 2 was the date when the vaccination program would begin. The Sussex County district has 15 schools and 8,700 students. Swine flu hasn’t hit it hard, as its attendance rate through last Friday was 94 percent, only slightly less than normal.
Rattay said the public health division has told districts that the school vaccination program will begin Nov. 2.
“But that does not mean that the kids in the Indian River schools will be vaccinated in that first week,” she said. “Nobody has been given a specific date. ... We will definitely follow up with them and make sure they understand the process for developing our schedule.”
Trinidad and Tobago:
Third swine flu death at Sando hospital
Yvonne Webb
Published: 16 Oct 2009
Yvonne Webb
http://guardian.co.tt/news/general/2009/10/16/third-swine-flu-death-sando-hospital
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33335326/ns/health-swine_flu
County to sick workers: Stay home or risk firing
Arizona county policy affects those with a temp of 100.4 or more
updated 7:18 p.m. ET, Thurs., Oct . 15, 2009
PHOENIX - Employees of an Arizona county who have flu symptoms or a temperature of at least 100.4 degrees must stay home from work or risk being disciplined or fired under a new policy, officials said Thursday. The requirement is aimed at lessening the spread of swine or seasonal flu illnesses among the county’s nearly 7,000 employees and among people who visit government buildings, Pima County Board of Supervisors chairman Richard Elias said.
Employees with flu symptoms would be required to stay home until at least 24 hours after the fever ends. A sick employee who ignores a manager’s order to go home face disciplinary action or firing. “It seems like we are being a bit draconian,” (Nope - it rocks! You go Elias!!!) Elias said. “But in consideration of our employees and their families and people who come in to do business in county buildings, we want people to fee free to call in sick.” Pima County, Arizona’s second largest county, has a population of 1 million and includes Tucson.
Jacqueline Byers, director of research for the National Association of Counties, said she hasn’t heard of other counties approving such a policy, though some K-12 schools and colleges are taking similar steps.
WI:
Milwaukee to hold 2 swine flu clinics
The Associated Press
Updated: 10/16/2009 05:02:40 AM CDT
http://www.twincities.com/wisconsin/ci_13575620?nclick_check=1
MILWAUKEE—The city of Milwaukee’s health department is holding two clinics Saturday so health care workers can get vaccinated against the swine flu.
City officials say they don’t have enough yet for the general public, but they hope to have clinics later this month.
The clinics will include the nasal form of the vaccination as well as a limited supply of the injectable form.
The department has vaccinated more than 350 city health care workers. The Saturday clinics are at the Northwest Health Center and Southside Health Center and will be open to health care workers who have direct patient contact.
video from last night’s NBC nightly news on ICU issues and the ECMO machines -
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/33335312#33335312
Walgreens, CVS shifting flu battle from seasonal to H1N1
October 16, 2009
http://www.suntimes.com/lifestyles/health/1828421,CST-NWS-flu16.article
Walgreen Co. and CVS Caremark Corp., the two largest drugstore chains, will stop providing seasonal flu vaccines at many locations to shift their focus to swine flu immunization.
Walgreens will not restock the seasonal flu vaccine after it runs out. Some Walgreens already are out. CVS said it will halt its seasonal flu clinics Oct. 22. Depending on how available the vaccine is, it will continue to offer shots at its 500 clinics throughout the flu season.
Fear of pandemic swine flu, H1N1, has heightened public awareness of seasonal influenza, causing vaccine shortages at doctors’ offices, clinics and retail drugstores. Manufacturers are behind in delivering supplies because they’re using factories to make both vaccines.
http://www.newstin.com/tag/us/151058734
School closures in Japan double because of swine flu pandemic
The number of schools in Japan closed because of the swine flu pandemic nearly doubled by Oct. 10 from a week earlier, according to figures from the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare.
Almost 6,480 schools, kindergartens and day-care centers were fully or partially closed because of the influenza outbreak, the report said.
Tokyo had the highest number, with 752 schools affected last week.
Japan had 52,956 schools and kindergartens in May this year, according to the Education Ministry.
School closures are at the highest since January 2000 when 4,131 schools were closed, said Takeshi Enami, Deputy Director of the division of infectious diseases at the... [read full story]
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/10/15/health/AP-US-MED-Swine-Flu-Six-Months-Later.html?_r=1
Swine Flu 6 Months Later: but Winter Looms
Swine Flu Shots Revive a Debate About Vaccines
October 16, 2009
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/16/health/16vaccine.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=flu&st=cse
D.C.:
Flu Shot Clinics Springing Up in Region
Pr. George’s Among the Latest to Open; Manassas, Loudoun County in Line
By Michael Laris
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 16, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/15/AR2009101503959.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6877260.ece
Pregnant teenager dies with baby after contracting swine
October 16, 2009
Charlene Sweeney, Sam LIster
Hopes that Scotland had overcome the worst of the swine flu crisis faded yesterday after it emerged that a pregnant teenager had died after contracting the virus and that the number of swine flu cases had doubled in the last week. Health officials said yesterday that the 17-year-old girl from the Borders had no underlying health problems. She is the second pregnant patient whose death was linked to swine flu in the past week. The teenager’s unborn child also died
Please elaborate on what L-Glutamine might do.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-swine-flu16-2009oct16,0,2482325.story
Outbreaks of flu are ‘way up’ in L.A. County
Statewide and locally, the viral disease is spreading faster than normal for this time of year.
By Rong-Gong Lin II October 16, 2009
State probes unexplained death of Kings Park boy, 8
October 15, 2009 By MICHAEL AMON. AND MATTHEW CHAYES. michael.amon@newsday.com., matthew.chayes@newsday.com
http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/state-probes-unexplained-death-of-kings-park-boy-8-1.1524114
The unexplained death of an 8-year-old Kings Park boy at Stony Brook University Medical Center has sparked a state Department of Health probe, authorities said Wednesday.
The boy - identified as Sean Weisse by a family member - was taken off life support Sunday, three days after being hospitalized with symptoms of fever, nausea and a sore throat, said Claudia Hutton, a health department spokeswoman.
“There is no reason to believe the hospital did anything except provide the best medical care,” Hutton said. “Any time a child dies unexpectedly, it is of great interest to us.”
The probe is not aimed at Stony Brook’s pediatric intensive care unit, the subject of state scrutiny for past quality of care issues, Hutton said. She said a hospital inspection team was investigating it as “an adverse event.”
Stony Brook staffers have conducted blood and spinal fluid tests but have not determined the cause of death, Hutton said, adding that doctors believed the fatal illness was viral. More tests are scheduled on the spinal fluid taken at St. Catherine of Siena Medical Center in Smithtown, where the boy was first taken after becoming ill, Hutton said.
There will be no autopsy at the family’s request, Hutton said.
“Mysterious deaths do happen and there are times when you cannot get all the answers that you want,” Hutton said. “I don’t know how certain, in the end, a cause of death will be.”
Sean, a third-grader at Park View Elementary School, is scheduled to be buried Thursday after a funeral Mass at St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church in Kings Park. The boy’s parents, Steven and Kelly Weisse, asked that donations be made to the Special Education Parent Teachers Association of the Kings Park Central School District. They declined interview requests.
Health authorities sought to assure the public that Sean did not die from a reaction to a flu vaccine shot last week, a claim posted this week on several Internet message boards and blogs.
Hutton said the boy was given a regular seasonal flu shot in a private physician’s office, but results from blood and spinal fluid tests show that it is “extremely unlikely” that the vaccination caused his illness later.
“There is always a very remote chance, but it is so remote that it is almost a scientific certainty that it is not vaccine-related,” Hutton said. “It is just a very sad family tragedy.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said fatal reactions to flu shots are rare.
At a wake in Kings Park Wednesday night, friends and family remembered a smiling boy who loved skateboarding. His skateboard was placed near his coffin amid flowers and photographs.
“Every picture he has a big grin on,” said Kerry Leo, a family friend from Kings Park.
Counselors were on hand this week at Park View Elementary to help students and faculty, said Susan Agruso, superintendent of the Kings Park Central School District. “This is a profoundly sad time for our community,” she said. “Our sincerest sympathies go out to the student’s parents, family and friends.”
Finland Sees First Signs of Swine Flu Epidemic
published today 01:18 PM, updated today 01:29 PM
http://yle.fi/uutiset/news/2009/10/finland_sees_first_signs_of_swine_flu_epidemic_1086910.html?origin=rss
The first epidemic wave of swine flu is hitting Finland. The National Institute for Health and Welfare says the H1N1 outbreaks in northern Finland are reaching epidemic proportions.
Last week the Sodankylä garrison saw an outbreak of H1N1 cases, and this week the Kainuu brigade reported conscripts falling ill with flu-like symptoms. Pockets of swine flu outbreaks have also been reported in the central Finnish towns of Kiuruvesi and Suonenjoki.
“This means Finland is entering into a period of accelerated outbreaks, although there is currently no clear epidemic,” says Professor Petri Ruutu of the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
The agency forecasts that it will be five to six weeks before the epidemic peaks. An epidemic phase of the H1N1 virus lasts between two to four weeks, according to the THL.
Ruutu says it’s unlikely Finland will see more than one H1N1 epidemic wave; however, he says it’s possible that two seasonal influenza waves will come on the heels of the H1N1 epidemic.
Finland received its first shipments of H1N1 vaccines this week. Authorities have begun distributing the vaccines to healthcare centres and hospital districts.
Healthcare personnel and expectant women will be the first to receive a vaccine for protection against the H1N1 swine flu virus.
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