Blogs

Date: Sat 4 Jul 2009
Source: 660News, All News Radio, The Canadian Press [edited]

All cases of Tamiflu resistance are not created equal. So while the
1st 3 instances of swine flu infection with Tamiflu-resistant viruses
were reported in the past week, it was Number 3, not Number 1 that put
influenza experts on edge. Public health authorities in Hong Kong
announced Friday [3 Jul 2009] they have found a case of Tamiflu
resistance in a woman who hadn't taken the drug. That means she was
infected with swine flu viruses that were already resistant to

This blog is intended to kick off a discussion on how Resilience Networks could support the achievement of the Millenium Development Goals

which will probably progress over a sustained period of time. However I thought it worth starting the discussion.

The spanish language newspaper "La Nacion" has several articles detailing the current situation in Argentina. The situation may be a precursor of what the Northern Hemisphere may face in the Fall.

Argentina has declared a health emergency. This is the first natonal health emergency since 2002.

The paper reports less activity in major cities in Argentina has slowed. Less people in the streets, on the subways, at the malls, in restaurants, and many shops closed.

New Webcasts Now Available
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Learning to Live in a World with the H1N1 Pandemic
http://smtp01.kff.org/t/1045/427611/485/0/
June 30, 2009 Rayburn House Office Building

The CSIS Global Health Policy Center and the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, in partnership with the Congressional Global Health Caucus, sponsored a briefing on the current H1N1 flu outbreak.

This is from CIDRAP; it’s an interview with one of the Flu Wiki crowdsourcers who was participating with the Friday meeting via webinar:

One family's experience

For Amy Bates Grant, preparing for a pandemic has been a process since 2006.

"I've learned everything that I could about pandemics," said the mother of two who lives outside Portland, Ore.

Grant said she used resources such as the Flu Wiki forum to learn how an influenza pandemic might affect her and her family, how to reduce exposure, and how she would cope if family members were infected.

http://www.developmentseed.org/blog/2009/jun/26/pandemic-preparedness-meeting-nih-community-resilience-live-streaming-today

On June 26th 2009 a dynamic synergy was established around the SO-H1N1 pandemic influenza at a Workshop hosted by the National Library of Medicine at the NIH near Washington DC.

Major steps were taken towards building a coalition of willing participants internal and external to government to better our nation’s planning and response efforts in support of the upcoming 2009 flu season.

By Lori Aratani
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Hospital emergency rooms and doctor's offices across the Washington region are reporting a higher-than-normal number of flu cases during a time of year when such infections are rare, a signal that the H1N1 virus continues to spread.

http://www.gwu.edu/~cih/journal/JHClink/v14n5_editorial.pdf

SWINE CONFLUSION
Journal of Health Communication: International Perspectives
Volume 14, Issue 5

Like a Hollywood thriller movie, the 2009 flu outbreak developed in real time, complete with phases of pandemic alert issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) as if they were DEFCON warnings, the defense readiness condition that gauges activation and readiness of the United States Armed Forces.

$7.7B For H1N1 Included In House War-Spending Bill; India Says Developed Countries Can Do More To Prevent Spread
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday narrowly passed a $106 billion war-funding bill, which "included 7.7 billion to help the nation prepare for an outbreak of the H1N1 virus, the so-called swine flu," the Washington Times reports (Rowland, Washington Times, 6/17). The spending bill will now move to the Senate for consideration (Pelofsky, Reuters, 6/16).

June 15, 2009
By Fid Thompson

World Health Organization chief Margaret Chan warned that the current swine flu pandemic could cripple fragile health services in poor countries.

"Developing countries have the greatest vulnerability and the least resilience. They will be hit the hardest and take the longest to recover," she told a U.N. forum on global health.

Last week, WHO raised its global alert to a maximum six, saying swine flu had reached pandemic status because of its geographical spread.

© 2009 NASDAQ

For full article, visit:

June 15, 2009
Reuters

Croatia identified the first case of H1N1 flu virus in a patient who came from abroad last week and has already recovered, the health minister said on Monday.

"The patient showed mild flu symptoms and the test, the results of which we received today, confirmed the H1N1 virus," Health Minister Darko Milinovic told reporters. "The patient underwent treatment at home and made a full recovery. He has already returned to work."

He declined to give details of the patient but said no one in his family had shown flu symptoms.

© Thomson Reuters 2009

June 16, 2009

Libyan authorities have reported an outbreak of bubonic plague in the Mediterranean coastal town of Tubruq, and the World Health Organisation was sending a team to investigate, a WHO official said.

The cases - approximately 16 to 18 have been reported - would be the first in more than two decades in Libya of the disease known in medieval times as the Black Death, according to John Jabbour, a Cairo-based emerging diseases specialist at WHO. "It is reported as bubonic plague," Jabbour said, adding WHO still didn't have "a full picture" of the situation.

June 18, 2009

Targeting children for vaccination may be the best way of using limited supplies of vaccine to control the current H1N1 flu pandemic, British researchers said.

Drugmakers are racing to make a vaccine against the new flu strain but if the disease increases significantly in the northern hemisphere autumn, as many experts fear, there are unlikely to be enough shots to vaccinate entire populations.

Helen Branswell of the Canadian Press, has an excellent article previewing the current challenges Manitoba, Canada hospitals are facing with numerous patients on ventilators, struggling to overcome swine flu infections.

Swine flu patients in ICU tough to manage, 'just really, really sick': doctors

In a typical flu season, the Winnipeg hospitals where Dr. Anand Kumar works might see one, maybe two life-threatening cases of viral pneumonia caused by influenza.

On June 18 2009, South Africa's Department of Health confirmed the country's first H1N1 case, Reuters reports. The department released a written statement saying, "The patient, a 12-year-old who flew in from the U.S. on Sunday, was admitted to hospital on Monday and was kept in isolation," Reuters writes. He has since been released from the hospital (Bosch, Reuters, 6/18).

http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-SwineFlu/idUSTRE55H2J520090618