Is there a flu epidemic or pandemic about to hit? (Actually, I’m not sure I know the difference between a pandemic and an epidemic.)
I’ve never seen so many people as sick as right now. Our office was nearly empty today. My father, age 75, spent the day in the hospital with type A influenza. My older daughter was also very sick today, presumably with the same. Both had received flu vaccinations about a month ago.
The local pharmacies are running out of antivirals.
Reading the news makes it sound like this is very widespread.
An epidemic is a widespread area of infection i.e. a whole county, state or country.
A pandemic is even bigger, i.e. several states in US or the majority of Europe or high volumes of cases spread throughout the globe.
In China SARS was at an epidemic level.
Due to people travelling by plane SARS was feared to become pandemic.
As for your question about flu, we too have many people off in our office at the moment and I recall seeing an article in a newspaper 2 months ago predicting a pandemic outbreak of flu in the next couple of years.
My advice, keep drinking plenty of water and take some Echinacea.
Traditionally an epidemic was 1 out of 3 or 33%. A pandemic was 9 out of 10 or 90%.
Now it is defined more or less as an epidemic is an outbreak of disease in a localized area or areas while a pandemic is an outbreak over several epidemic areas.
For example: the acme virus is epidemic in Mississippi and Florida. But if it broke out in Georgia and Alabama it would become PANDEMIC because it now connects the areas experiencing epidemics.
Kind of vauge.
I heard on CNN and MSNBC yesterday that a new study found echinacea to be ineffective and useless.
The CDC reports that while MANUFACTURERS of the flu virus vaccine are out, that doesn’t mean the doctors are out. The manufactuers are private companies. The vaccine is related to the current outbreak but not in the current vaccine.
Here is a good site that explains a little more about how a flu pandemic comes about Flu Info
They have said that one is do to hit , that we are do for one ,but right now basically what people are probably seeing is a low end epidemic regionally.
Sounds about right , the vaccine takes about two weeks to take effect ,and if it works right , you get a lesser form of the Flu , to get your body imunized against the deadly verison.
I heard a report that the two main companies that supply the shots , made up 80 million doses for the current year and are running out.
How widespread is the deadly strain that killed so many in Colorado and such? I got the flu over Thanksgiving and I just about mistook it for a cold, it was so mild. The giveaway was that the people I got it from got much sicker and exhibited traditional flulike symptoms. I also got the vaccine in late October, right when it first became available to non-medicos in my area, but if the most recent vaccine is ineffective against the deadly strain I suppose I’m not out of the woods yet.
So, how far has the greatest amount of risk spread?
I can’t remember ever getting a flu vaccination, and I can’t remember ever getting the flu. Er. I hate getting shots, so I haven’t gotten any in years. I was actually happy for my eczema when I read a thing about how people with eczema couldn’t get a Small Pox vaccine for the threat of huge rashes, or something.
I’ve heard on the news that the vaccine they’ve been giving for this year’s flu, er, doesn’t work. I don’t know how they decide what to vaccinate against every year.
AnimistDragon: They decide in January by looking at what’s out then and guessing. Really, that’s it: They guess. This year, they guessed wrong, so one or two strains slipped through and are not included in the vaccine. The vaccine protects against the rest of the strains, just not those.
They guess right an amazing amount of the time, really. Getting a flu shot is among the best things you can do to improve your odds of not getting seriously ill in the coming flu season. As for smallpox, well, remember that smallpox is lethal. If you’d rather get a fatal disease than a few stabs in the arm, that’s your own lookout. Just stay away from me.
Interesting that this thread should come up. At my University such widespread flu infection is also occurring. In fact, I’m sick with it right now (getting better though; had a fever and “the shakes”).
Anyway, we this year’s flu vaccine available to us several weeks ago. I never bothered to get it (I never have, for that matter). I guess I should be kicking myself now.
I know that they didn’t quite get this year’s vaccine correct with repect to exact strains of Influenza A. But they got close, and still expect the vaccine to be somewhat effective, and certainly worth getting. Anecdotal evidecne, for sure, but I think I can vouch for the effectiveness of this year’s flu shot.
At the AFB where I work, they have been giving flu shots for over a month. It’s mandatory for military personnel, but free and encouraged for civilians. I figured I had nothing to lose for a free flu shot, and it got me out of the office for a few minutes.
This week, my wife missed four days of work with a pretty severe flu (she never got a flu shot). I can only assume it was severe because of her measurable symptoms, but she doesn’t tolerate discomfort very well and it seemed like the end of the world to her. But with a 103-degree fever, etc., I’d say it was pretty serious. I spent time at home taking care of her, didn’t try too hard to shield myself from her nasty virus, and never got sick. I can only assume that my vaccination was responsible.
Lesson learned…I’ll make sure we both get the flu shot in future years.
I guess you could say “they guess” in the sense that people who bet on the outcome of the Superbowl “guess” who’s going to win.
Here’s how the CDC describes the process: “Each year, many labs throughout the world, including in the United States, collect flu viruses. Some of these flu viruses are sent to one of four World Health Organization (WHO) reference labs, one of which is at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, for detailed testing. These laboratories also test how well antibodies made to the current vaccine react to the circulating virus and new flu viruses. This information, along with information about flu activity, is summarized and presented to an advisory committee of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and at a WHO meeting. These meetings result in the selection of three viruses (two subtypes of influenza A viruses and one influenza B virus) to go into flu shots for the following fall and winter. Usually one or two of the three virus strains change in the vaccine each year.”
As for how well this year’s vaccine works against this year’s flu strains, the CDC says this: "Influenza viruses are changing all the time, and vaccine effectiveness depends, in part, on the match between vaccine strains and circulating viruses. Although the A (H3N2) strain in this year’s flu vaccine is somewhat different from the main circulating strain causing illness in the United States so far, laboratory studies indicate that the vaccine should still provide some cross-protection against the circulating A (H3N2) strain. " This issue is that although the lab studies show that the vaccine should be at least partially protective, we do not have actual data on how effective it is in people. Unfortunately, such data probably won’t be available until near the end of the flu season.
IANA doctor, but this seems misleading. you don’t contract the flu from the flu vaccine. they inject you with a dead virus and your body produces antibodies.
the small pox vaccine, however, is a live virus, i believe, so you do contract a mild case to immunize yourself.
jujuju…one of the biggest myths surrounding the flu shot is that it gives you a mild case of the disease. The CDC and other public health organizations try really hard to bat that one down.
A couple of years ago I got a flu shot for the very first time, as my employer at the time was offering them to everyone in the office free of charge. Within 24 hours of receiving the shot, I was sicker than I had ever been without having received the flu shot.
I made mention of this a few weeks later (and still suffering a little of the aftermath of the flu I got) at a seminar I was giving to a room full of doctors. When I said that I’d never get another flu shot because it made me so ill, I thought I was going to be pelted with rotten tomatoes. They told me with no uncertainty that the influenza vaccine contains dead viruses and cannot possibly make me sick. I still call BS, as that thing infected me to a degree I’ve never experienced before. I’m young, healthy, and typically don’t suffer from any more than a minor cold or two every year. I’m convinced, somehow, it made me sick.
The point of all this is, yes, it’s my understanding that you are injected with only dead viruses, but I wouldn’t necessarily count on that being true.
Well, standup karmic, I suggest you check out audilover’s link. It explains things nicely.
If one gets influenza, one has fevers up to and over 103, severe headache, terrible body pains, and a horrible cough that can break ribs. It knocks one out of commission for over a week in most cases. Rate this illness an 8 or 9 for severity. (to me a 10 is where one is stripping one’s own flesh off one’s arms with one’s teeth to distract oneself from one’s symptoms)
Whereby the most severe reactions seen in first-time flu shot recipients generally consist of malaise, mild aches, and mild headache, all of which are pretty much gone in less than 72 hours. Fevers (temps over 101) are rare. It’s a 2, or a 3 max on the discomfort scale.
Uh…I dunno. I never took my temperature. I was out of commission for about a week. I had stomach cramps the like of which I’d never before and never since felt (I buckled over a few times, the wrenching in my gut was so painful), I didn’t have a headache - but then I rarely get them, don’t remember what the cough was like. If there were a scale that went between the two illnesses that you described, I’d say I was closer to the nastier of the two.
I also suffered from depleted energy and general listlessness for a few weeks afterwards. I could just feel something generally bringing my whole system down, but I wasn’t actively ill.
I got my flu shot! Usually my arm gets sore for a couple of days, but this time all I had was a hard spot around the injection site, like a horsefly had bitten me. Haven’t seen many sickies on my campus anyways, though.
Standup Karmic, I think you missed Qadgop’s point. That wasn’t a mere reaction to a vaccine. That was the flu. And since you say your symptoms developed within 24 hours of receiving the vaccine, it definitely wasn’t the vaccine that gave it to you - because the timing’s all wrong. Even if the flu vaccine was a live virus vaccine (and it isn’t) and it was thus possible to catch influenza from receiving it, it would have taken several days for you to become ill after receiving the shot if the vaccine was the cause. Viral ilnesses have an asymptomatic prodromal phase between the time of infection and the start of symptoms, and that prodromal phase typically lasts at least 2-3 days.
What happened to you that year was that you had already picked up the flu from someone else before you received your vaccination, and you were in the asymptomatic early stage of the infection when you got the shot. You’d have started showing symptoms on that day regardless of whether you’d gone ahead with the vaccination or not. The vaccine can’t protect you if youre already ill. And you were - you just didn’t know it yet.
It takes about 2 weeks for your body to respond completely to the influenza vaccination. Moral of the story: if you don’t want to experience the miserable illness you described again, defintely get your flu shot - and this time, get it earlier in the season!
Just some personal evidence.
On the hospital floor where I work there are currently 9 people admitted with positive flu tests, and out of those 6 have had the flu shot in the past month.
I agree with getting a flu shot, but I don’t think the current strain of flu out there matches the current vaccine, in most cases. Not that there can’t be several strains out there at the same time.
beajerry, you’re right on both counts. There are always multile strains of influenza A and influenza B in circulation, but typically only one or two of each type will become the “major players” during a typical flu season. Production of flu vaccine requires an educated guess about which strains will end up being the major ones (since work on the vaccine has to begin months before flu season is underway); this year everyone guessed wrong, and one of the most prevalent strains isn’t included in the vaccine (although another strain it bears some antigenic relationship to is, so the vaccine may still offer some partial protection).