Swine Flu: Articles, updates and links: 25 May - 01 June

News reports on swine flu / H1N1 are showing no slow down in the virus. Bloomberg.com reports flu cases in Australia are doubling about every two days, with 401 confirmed cases as of June 01. This has risen from 20 on May 25. Most cases are in the colder southeastern state of Victoria with 306 cases, up from 173 two days earlier.

Sixty-two countries have officially reported 17,410 cases of swine flu, including 115 deaths. Four of every five cases occurred in Mexico and the U.S., where the virus was discovered about seven weeks ago. Raina MacIntyre, head of public health at the University of New South Wales believes The virus has probably infected more Australians than official data show. Guessing that for every confirmed case there is somewhere between 2 and 10 unconfirmed cases.

The US Center for Disease Control has a newer webpage FlueView: a weekly influenza surveillance report. The CDC has been releasing very clear statements aimed at increasing general understanding. Including this:

"Novel influenza A (H1N1) is a new flu virus of swine origin that was first detected in April, 2009. The virus is infecting people and is spreading from person-to-person, sparking a growing outbreak of illness in the United States. An increasing number of cases are being reported internationally as well.

It’s thought that novel influenza A (H1N1) flu spreads in the same way that regular seasonal influenza viruses spread; mainly through the coughs and sneezes of people who are sick with the virus.

It’s uncertain at this time how severe this novel H1N1 outbreak will be in terms of illness and death compared with other influenza viruses. Because this is a new virus, most people will not have immunity to it, and illness may be more severe and widespread as a result. In addition, currently there is no vaccine to protect against this novel H1N1 virus. CDC anticipates that there will be more cases, more hospitalizations and more deaths associated with this new virus in the coming days and weeks."

Medical News Today reports St. Bartholomew's (Barts) hospital professor of virology, John Oxford predicting a flu outbreak will strike prior to any vaccine being available. In an article from the Guardian.co.uk online, Oxford said the number of sporadic cases that are now unrelated to travel suggests the virus is spreading "silently" around the UK.
He also offers this vision that fighting the flu as being like defending a "medieval castle" with several layers of defence.

"You've got the outer layer that is hygiene and social distancing, then the virus breaks through that and then we have antivirals like Tamiflu and then the final layer is the vaccine.

"You chuck all of this at the virus. You can't stop it, but you can slow it down," he said."The best advice is to carry on as normal but to be sensible about it. This includes a bit of social distancing and shielding people from coughs."

Meanwhile The Bulgarian Health Ministry has confirmed that the country has officially joined the list of countries affected by the swine flu pandemic. The virus was discovered in a Bulgarian citizen who flew from New York, via Amsterdam, and arrived at Sofia International Airport on May 27 2009.

And finally the question of when is a pandemic a pandemic seems to be getting louder and louder. May 31st Washington Post has a article New Virus Spurs Experts to Rethink Definition of Pandemic in which staff writer David Brown reminds us "Virtually every assumption made since planning for a pandemic began in earnest after the deadly "bird flu" outbreak of 2004 in Southeast Asia has been contradicted by the six-week history of swine-origin influenza A (H1N1)."

Apparently most of the WHO prediction experts assumed the next pandemic jump from birds to humans, and it would arise in Asia with a death rate that was pronounced (H5N1 has appeared to be highly lethal, above 50%), immediately recognized, and fought with an urgency of impending global population collapse.

At the moment, we may have what a May 29th article in New Scientist suggests is an invisible pandemic. Reporting that an investigation by New Scientist showed that current EU rules could make H1N1 appear much less widespread in Europe than it is.

The mildness of the current virus in some (perhaps many?) individuals is highlighted in this article from Australias ABC News
New swine flu case: 'I've had worse paper cuts': A Canberra man who has become one of Australia's latest confirmed swine flu cases says he doesn't even feel very ill.

Moscow Times 01 June reports Russia Offers Flu Aid to U.S. The article states "The Federal Consumer Protection Service said Saturday that it had offered to help the United States and Mexico diagnose cases of the A/H1N1 influenza virus, also known as the swine flu.

The service, which monitors sanitation standards and infectious diseases, said in a statement that it had asked the Foreign Ministry to convey its interest in helping with "diagnostic research," and that it had formed three groups of researchers dedicated to the task."