Daily flu thermometer ... by gimleteye

The Helen Branswell twitter meter is slowing, only up 51%; a measure of increase of people following Branswell on Twitter . Branswell is the leading science journalist on flu. Over the weekend she had an astounding tweet: that the home belonging to the lead influenza official at the CDC had been struck and burned by lighting. Today we have news of confirmed cases in M-D schools. In a front page story, the New York Times: "The best way to track the spread of swine flu across the United States in the coming weeks may be to imagine it riding a dollar bill. The routes taken by millions of them are at the core of a computer model at Northwestern University that is predicting the epidemic’s future. Reassuringly, it foresees only about 2,000 cases by the end of this month, mostly in New York, Los Angeles, Miami and Houston."

The point of quarantine efforts are to keep the number of cases down: the higher volume of transmissions, the more opportunity for the flu gene to mutate. The concern is that a new flu virus that is easily transmittable from human to human, albeit more like an ordinary flu in its effects, will meet up and recombine with the really nasty virus that is moving in some bird populations and really harmful when people are infected. Reducing the chance for that to occur is an excellent and worthy public health goal. No one knows if it is within our means to be successful, but whatever the costs, they are a lot cheaper than a bad flu pandemic.

Do you have the flu? Let us know, what's going on in your flu world. (click, 'read more')

Published: 2009-05-04
Flu movement between species raises concerns
More mutations of the virus possible, meaning it may become more virulent

By ALLISON JONES and HELEN BRANSWELL The Canadian Press


The discovery of the new swine flu in pigs on an Alberta farm raises a spectre that worries influenza experts: the possibility of the virus moving back and forth between humans and pigs, giving it more chances to mutate along the way.

About 220 pigs in a herd of 2,200 began showing signs of the flu April 24, Canadian officials revealed over the weekend. A farmhand who travelled to Mexico and fell ill upon his return is believed to have infected the pigs with the H1N1 influenza virus.

While the development did not come as a surprise to the World Health Organization or other experts, they expressed concern.

"We expected that at some point since this virus has swine virus elements that we would find possibly the virus in swine pigs in the region where the virus is circulating," Dr. Peter Ben Embarek, a WHO food safety scientist, said Sunday from Geneva.

Measures should be taken to prevent further human exposure to sick animals because of a risk people around the pigs could become infected, Embarek said.

"It has happened in the past with classical swine influenza," he said.

Dr. Ruben Donis, head of the molecular genetics branch of the influenza division at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, said the movement of a virus from one species to another creates more opportunities for mutations.

While it isn’t a given that any changes in the virus would mean it becomes more virulent — causes more severe disease — that cannot be ruled out, he said.

"It’s possible," Donis said in an interview from Atlanta. "We have to consider all options."

Donis was especially concerned about the virus getting seeded in pig populations on small farms that don’t have the same level of biosecurity as larger operations.

Another worker on the Alberta farm subsequently fell ill, but it’s not yet known if that person caught the swine flu. The herd in central Alberta has been quarantined, and all of the pigs are recovering or have recovered. The farm worker has also recovered.

Meanwhile, Mexico’s health secretary declared the swine flu outbreak to be declining in his country, though health officials warned against complacency in combatting the spread of the disease.

In Egypt police and armoured cars charged into a crowd of a 1,000 irate pig farmers armed with stones and bottles Sunday.

Twelve people were injured as residents of a Cairo slum resisted government efforts to slaughter the nation’s pigs to guard against swine flu.

Dr. Christopher Olsen, a swine flu expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said having this H1N1 influenza A virus go back into swine creates opportunities for it to pick up genetic mutations or swap genes with other flu viruses. Canada’s swine flu caseload swelled Sunday to 101 after health officials in British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba Quebec, Ontario and Nova Scotia reported new confirmed cases. Worldwide the WHO confirmed 787 cases in 17 countries.

But even as the tally of people infected with swine flu continued to rise Sunday — at least six other countries reported new cases — Mexico’s health secretary said the swine flu epidemic in his country "is now in its declining phase."

Jose Angel Cordova said data suggest the epidemic peaked sometime between April 23 and April 28, and that drastic measures — closing the nation’s schools, shuttering most of its businesses and banning mass public gatherings — apparently have helped curb the flu’s spread.

But Gregory Hartl, the WHO spokesman for epidemic and pandemic diseases, cautioned against any premature declarations.

"That might be certainly what the current epidemiology is showing," he said from Geneva in response to Cordova’s comments.

"I also would like to remind people that in 1918 the Spanish flu showed a surge in the spring and then disappeared in the summer months, only to return in the autumn of 1918 with a vengeance."

’In 1918 the Spanish flu showed a surge in the spring and then disappeared in the summer months, only to return in the autumn of 1918 with a vengeance.’

GREGORY HARTLWHO spokesman
CLOSE WINDOW
© 2008 The Halifax Herald Limited