outbreak
tsmith | April 29, 2009The latest numbers of confirmed cases from the CDC were released about an hour ago. 91 cases have been confirmed, with the largest numbers in New York (51), California (14), and Texas (16). One new case has also been confirmed in Nevada, one in Indiana, one in Arizona, and 2 in Michigan; the other Ohio case I know of is still pending, apparently. Ongoing investigations are also taking place in multiple states, so expect the number to keep rising for the time being. [Update: 2 cases just confirmed in Massachussets, and three in Maine.]
The first fatality has also been reported: a 23-month-…
tsmith | April 28, 2009Back in 2007, I wrote about an outbreak of swine influenza from an Ohio county fair. The peer-reviewed paper analyzing the swine influenza isolated from that outbreak has just recently come out. From the abstract:
The swine isolate, A/SW/OH/511445/2007 (OH07), was evaluated in an experimental challenge and transmission study reported here. Our results indicate that the OH07 virus was pathogenic in pigs, was transmissible among pigs, and failed to cross-react with many swine H1 anti-sera. Naturally exposed pigs shed virus as early as 3 days and as long as 7 days after contact with…
tsmith | April 28, 2009Revere on quarantine versus isolation. This is a topic I've covered previously (here) as well, and an important distinction (though the two are often muddled together in the press).
Christine Gorman talks about getting the facts straight on swine flu, and offers up many additional resources to keep you updated.
Skepchick provides "Things More Likely to Save You From Swine Flu Than Homeopathy". Colon cleanse and chiropractic are noticeably absent...
1976 swine flu Public Service Announcements. They don't make 'em like that anymore... (h/t http://twitter.com/tomburket)
Finally, my…
tsmith | April 28, 2009Stories in Spanish: Costa Rica becomes the first Central American country to confirm swine flu ("gripe porcina"). A 21 year old who had traveled to Mexico is in stable condition. An additional 16 cases were examined but were negative. Brazil is also examining 11 travelers; cases are also being examined in Panama, Honduras, Argentina, and Uruguay, and Chile.
In Asia, South Korea is examining a possible case, while China's stepped up its efforts to look for cases (and blocked import of pork from the US and Mexico).
Most of the cases that are being examined have traveled to Mexico…
tsmith | April 28, 2009I was introduced to snake oil salesmen at a young age. My mother was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis when I was in kindergarten, and while she has mostly followed the advice of her neurologists, she's also looked into "alternate" therapies, ranging from the relatively harmless (massages, oils, etc.) to more invasive methods (chelation, all sorts of expensive but worthless supplements). Some of these I've been able to talk her out of (and I personally think her current doctor--NOT a neurologist--is a total quack), but others she's taken because, hey, "what's the harm?" It's frustrating to…
tsmith | April 27, 2009...asked Joe. Answer: only a few days to sequence, clean up the data, and submit to NCBI. Seven H1N1 swine flu sequences are up (H/T Jonathan Eisen). I've not had a chance to crack anything open yet, but I hope to see some analysis from more of the genomics geeks soon...However, one bummer is that they don't have any from the Mexico cases available--and particularly, any sequence data from any of the fatal cases. These will be helpful to see if there are any point mutations that could possibly account for a virulence difference between the Mexican and US cases. (Unlikely, I'd guess,…
tsmith | April 27, 2009As expected, new potential cases are being investigated in several states, including an additional possible case in Northern California, 2 potential cases in Indiana, a potential case in Ohio and another in Michigan [updated: and some in Massachusetts too]. New York has also confirmed 20 cases now, and 17 more are suspected (check here for additional information--updated as new cases come in and are confirmed or ruled out). Around the world, four in France have apparently tested negative, as have two potential cases in Australia, while 2 in Scotland have been confirmed positive. In Mexico…
tsmith | April 27, 2009For those of you looking to follow new cases (most of them suspected at this point, not confirmed), a great resource is HealthMap. Reports are popping up of possible infections worldwide: Scotland, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand. Certainly additional possible cases will be showing up over the coming days as well.
One thing I've seen mentioned (including here in the comments) is a question about the unlikelihood of a flu outbreak in Mexico in late April. Isn't influenza a cold-weather bug? Well, yes and no. Influenza circulates year-round at a low level, but it lasts longer in the…
tsmith | April 26, 2009While there's interest and some new readers, I figured I'd link some of my older posts on swine influenza and pandemic influenza in general for some additional background information and history. Keep in mind that these are unrelated to the current outbreak.
Pandemic influenza series (a bit dated, but still some good information in there, including an overview of 20th century pandemics).
Asymptomatic swine flu infections in farmers
Swine flu in Ohio fairgoers
Iowan has swine flu
New swine influenza virus detected
Masks and influenza
Masks and influenza part II
tsmith | April 26, 2009According to new information from the CDC, in addition to the 2 cases in Texas, 7 in California, and 2 in Kansas, the 8 in New York have now been confirmed, and an additional case has also been confirmed in Ohio (I've not seen any info on that case)--UPDATED below. Investigations are apparently ongoing in at least 2 Canadian provinces, also (British Columbia and Nova Scotia). An investigation is also ongoing in New Zealand after teenagers took a trip to Mexico and have shown flu-like symptoms.
Concerning to say the least, but crof and revere both have some excellent posts to keep things…
tsmith | April 26, 2009Over the last 24 hours, I've received a few comments and even more emails asking about or discussing the possibility of a "cytokine storm" triggered by the H1N1 swine flu reassortant. Is this what's happening in the cases from Mexico? Discussion after the jump...
Let me begin with a bit of background on what's meant by a "cytokine storm." In response to infection, the body has a number of ways to fight back against the invading microbe. Cytokines are one part of this defense. These are molecules produced by a number of different types of cells in response to infection that act as signals…
tsmith | April 25, 2009Sorry for the radio silence--I've been working on grants and manuscripts like a fiend, and so have tried to limit as many distractions as possible (which, unfortunately, includes blogging). However, the swine flu news is right up my alley, so I do just want to say a few words about it, and point you to some excellent stories already up elsewhere.
First, in case you've not been paying attention to the news in the last few days, there have been 8 reported cases of swine influenza infections in humans (6 in California and 2 in Texas, with additional suspected cases) and reports from Mexico…
palmd | January 19, 2009You've probably read about the current Salmonella outbreak. It's a fine example of what can happen when food is produced and distributed on an industrial scale---even one small contamination event can spread widely in the food supply, and there isn't much of a system in place to follow the trail of contaminants. Others have covered the public health implications of this outbreak, so I'd like to examine some other facts that make this outbreak disturbing.
Salmonella likes non-human animals
Some species of Salmonella cause typhoid fever. Typhoid fever, a nasty epidemic disease of humans, is…
tsmith | December 29, 2008As the Philippines requests international assistance to investigate the finding of Ebola Reston in their pigs, another human outbreak of Ebola has been confirmed in the Democratic Republic of Congo:
The Ministry of Health (MoH) of the Democratic Republic of the Congo declared on 25 December an outbreak of Ebola haemorrhagic fever in Mweka District, Kasai Occidental province based on laboratory results from the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville (CIRMF) in Gabon. CIRMF confirmed the presence of Ebola virus in 2 samples from 2 of the patients in the outbreak by antigen…
tsmith | November 20, 2008 Few things can take me out of blogging hibernation (especially when the next grant deadline is Monday...) However, one of those things that I'll carve out time to write about is an interesting, hot-off-the-presses Ebola paper, and especially one describing a new strain of the virus--and there just happens to be such a paper in the new edition of PLoS Pathogens. Details after the jump...
Previously, 4 types of Ebola viruses had been identified. Ebola Zaire has typically been the worst as far as fatality rates (around 80-90%), with Ebola Sudan coming in close behind (roughly 50-70%). The…
tsmith | July 23, 2008Revere once again is the voice of reason regarding latest developments in Tomatogate (e.g., the ongoing outbreak of Salmonella, serovar Saintpaul). Has the source been identified?
For those of you who many not have been following this closely, the outbreak has now hit almost every state, with over 1200 confirmed cases identified since April and more than 200 hospitalizations. Though the outbreak was initially associated with tomatoes, investigators were unable to link tomatoes to the specific strain--a relatively rare one--and advice to consumers to avoid varieties of tomatoes didn't put…
tsmith | July 11, 2008Marburg is a filovirus; a cousin of Ebola. Both cause hemorrhagic fever; both have been recently discovered in fruit bats; both have hit Africa in a small number of human outbreaks. Both also remain largely mysterious; we know very little about their ecology in the wild; how frequently they really infect humans (and other animal species; Ebola especially has taken a toll on great apes); and their mode of transmission from their wild reservoir to primate hosts. These enormous gaps in our knowledge remain despite recently passing the 40-year mark since the discovery of filoviruses in a lab…
tsmith | June 20, 2008Here in the Iowa City-Cedar Rapids corridor, the waters have been going down for several days, and people are being allowed back into their homes and businesses to begin assessing the damage and cleaning up what remains. However, while the dangers from the initial flooding are receding along with the waters, the clean-up and aftermath bring about a new set of misery.
Flooding is a potential nightmare when it comes to infectious diseases. The water can bring people returning to their flooded residences into contact with sewage, animal carcasses, and other sources of pathogens--and warm…
tsmith | May 15, 2008I'm taking a quick hiatus from my hiatus. I mentioned that I had quite a bit of travel upcoming, and I happen to be in the midst of my first trip. However, it just so happens that where I've landed--Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia--is experiencing an outbreak of hand, foot, and mouth disease in kids, caused by Enterovirus-71. More after the jump...
You may have read about this virus in prior weeks, as China has been dealing with a major outbreak there:
The number of hand-foot-mouth disease (HFMD) cases reported in China this year rocketed to 15,799 as of Tuesday, resulting in 26 deaths, according…
tsmith | April 10, 2008 It's hard to believe that it's been 2 years since Iowa's 2006 mumps outbreak (more background and details on that here, here, here, and here).
By the time the outbreak ended, 8 states had been heavily affected (and 45 reported at least one case), with a total of 6584 cases of mumps and 85 hospitalizations reported by the end of 2006. All told, this was the largest outbreak of the virus in approximately 20 years, after a 1986-1990 outbreak resulted in a change in the recommended vaccine schedule (adding a booster shot of MMR).
A paper out in today's New England Journal analyzes the…