Bird flu and regular flu

[hedgehog]

You can't do much about bird flu, so why worry? On the other hand, plain old flu kills thousands every year. It's up to you to protect your elderly friends and relatives by getting YOUR flu shot shot. Here's the deal. The flu shot doesn't work well for older folks because their immune systems aren't as responsive. That's the same reason the flu hits them so much harder. By getting your shot, you're breaking the chain of infection .

[hobbit709]

1. The best way

to break the chain of infection is not to go out in public and spread it. Unfortunately, there are all these ads on TV that say "feel bad, got a cold or fever-then take this and you'll feel better so that you can go out and work and socialize" thereby spreading the germs. And too many people are pressured to work even when sick because of no sick time, fear of job loss, etc.

[vi5]

2. Excellent point.....

I really can't agree with this strongly enough.

[MoJoWorkin]

5. agreed

My elderly parents had their flu shots last year---still got the flu(from a sick person in waiting room at their regular check up Dr. visit) and then gave it to me. My father ended up in the hospital with complications, and I was taking care of them all while I was really sick. I didn't get a shot last year, as I was not in the category of those who should---and there was a lack of shots, if you remember. I don't intend to get a shot this year, either. I am not sure they do much good.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

6. Would you believe - my repug boss actually says...

"If you are sick - stay home" :wow:

[insane_cratic_gal]

17. Agree if your kids are sick

Keep them home! Or find someone to stay home with them. Taking care of yourself when you sick is always a good idea. I use to tell my boss, I can come to work but I'll make another 15 people ill who will make another 50 people ill, which do you prefer to miss? Me or 65 other people I'll infect.

[WildClarySage]

3. Actually, the very best way to stop the spread of flu is to

vaccinate your children. Children are the primary carriers of flu viruses, but fortunately are also the most receptive to the effectiveness of the vaccine. Adults are less likely to respond by manufacturing immunity in response to the flu. Elderly adults even less so. If you work with a vulnerable population or are yourself vulnerable because of age, physical/medical condition or compromised immunity, get the shot. Otherwise, get your children theirs first and work with your community to get the word out that our kids should be first in line for the vaccine.

[ScreamingMeemie]

4. I think we also need to be concerned with immuno deficient people...

It isn't just the elderly that the flu affects.

[no_hypocrisy]

7. Recommended: Build up your immunity now.

Eat a balanced, healthy diet (I know, I know, if you can afford it . . . ), get enough sleep, drink enough water, exercise.

And wash your hands, wash your hands, wash your hands.

It's possible to be exposed to the virus and not contract it with the right conditions.

[Bridget Burke]

8. And "regular" flu vaccine may be in short supply again.

Heard it on the news this AM. Chiron's production schedule is running late. (That's the same company whose unsafe methods led to last year's shortage.) This can be a problem because people who take the vaccine need to develop immunity before the season really kicks in. I'll get mine at work--if there is any left for us low risk folks.

I consider Bird Flu a real possibility for the future--worthy of concern. But when I consider the Bush administration's lack of preparation & desire to turn any situation to their benefit--I begin to get scared.

[Crayson]

9. H5N1 MUTATION... that's the problem

Viruses have an extreme short life cycle and everything with a short life cycle mutates/adapts very fast.

The problem with every flu virus... every new wave (every year usually) it's slighty different and vaccines don't work anymore.

Since evrybody has had a "normal" flu your learning anti immune system already knows that general type of flu, even if it's slightly different from last years flu. So you maybe get a bit of fever and that was it...

Now the the bird flu (H5N1 virus) is not the same viral strain.
It' something new! Your anti immune system doesn't know it yet.
That's why it has a casualty rare of ALMOST 50 % !!!
As for now the bird flu is only known to have jumped from birds onto human beings... it's not transmitted from human to human.
That's why there are so few bird flue cases in people! They had to contract it from birds.

So for now you can lean back and say "phew"....



/doomsday on

BUT
If the virus undergoes the mutation that lets jump from human to human directly then we're in deep doodoo!

If the casualty rate of H5N1 stays the same and it behaves like a normal flu transmitted through the air and vaccines like Tamiflu won't take effect because it is a different strain than normal flue, then say goodbye!!!

/doomsday off

[Skittles]

10. interesting first-post read there, Crayson!

:hi:

[electron_blue]

11. Crayson, how come almost every article I read on bird flu ends with

something like this:

"But it is thought that a few cases of human-to-human spread of H5N1 have occurred."

?

Is this supposed to mean that it's mutated already? As in, ps - we think it's already mutated?

[Crayson]

13. 1 case suspected human to human

I read of one case of a patient who died of bird flu and who suspectedly contracted it from somebody else.

Very informative link to BBC
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4337918.stm>

[electron_blue]

14. thanks, so maybe it already mutated, hard to know for sure

[nadinbrzezinski]

19. that is why health workers around the world are scrambling

they take the treat seriously

[Citizen Jane]

22. Yep, CDC posted new updates today...

see my other post at:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=5083706&mesg_id=5083706

[Silverhair]

25. The question is how easily it can go from H to H.

In the suspected H-H cases, the people were in close contact. Family members.

To date there are no know cases of casual H-H transmission. Yet.

[insane_cratic_gal]

20. I thought I had read

Viruses usually mutate in order to not kill it's host.
If it kills too quickly it can't survive for long periods to spread and infect more therefor mutating? So by that train of madness or thought, can't the strain be mutating to less deadly strain for the purpose of survival?

Or does that not make any sense?

[gkhouston]

21. viruses don't play chess

they don't wake up in the morning, stretch, and say, "how can I mutate today to optimize my chances of survival?" They simply mutate. Some of those mutations help them spread further or survive longer and are successful. Others aren't, and killing your host too quickly can indeed be a Bad Idea. Over time, the viruses that make the "good" choices are usually the ones that are left to infect us another day. That doesn't mean there won't be a virus mutation that makes a "bad" choice that can kill an alarmingly large number of us before dying out itself.

[insane_cratic_gal]

26. LOL thank you

for clearing that up and with humor..

I guess it was the killing the host too quickly as it did with birds lead the virus to start looking for another host, us.

[gkhouston]

27. ah, hell no.

viruses are just like us, sidling up to the All-U-Can-Eat Salad Bar... they'll take a spoonful of everything. ;-)

[Bridget Burke]

24. With so many people in the world with with NO immunity to this flu.....

There's no shortage of hosts.

[cynatnite]

30. In reply to your doomsday quote :)

It is possible to beat this if a person is infected. While viral infections are relatively hard to treat, secondary complications may not be. What I've read is that bacterial lung infections do happen in many of these cases and can be treated with antibiotics. It's helped assure survivability in a lot of cases.

Not always a goodbye :)

[SheilaT]

12. Several points.

1. Flu shots don't work as well as claimed. It's been in the news recently, so if you don't believe me do your own fast google search.

2. Every single year without fail for at least a decade now, maybe much longer, there's hype that the coming flu season will be unusually deadly and so everyone must get flu shots and Oh. My. God. there's not enough flu vaccine and we're all going to die.

3. Getting a case of the flu provides better and longer immunity than a shot.

4. Too many people take pride in going to work no matter how sick they are. Too many people don't have reasonable sick leave policies. If sick people actually stayed home there would be somewhat less colds and flu going around at any given time.

5. Why the hysteria is out that avian flu is about to mutate and become easily transmissible human to human is completely a mystery to me. Flu mutates constantly and in a somewhat predictable way, which is why flu vaccines are possible at all, since they have to decide about nine months ahead of time which forms of the virus to include. There is no reason I can see to think the avian flu will make the jump, and so I'm highly suspicious of the hype.

6. If you remember the Great Swine Flu Scare of 1976 -- and there's an excellent chapter on it in Laurie Garrett's excellent book The Coming Plague, as well as many sources on the internet, so google away -- if you remember that you'll see an incredible similarity between now and then.

[ScreamingMeemie]

15. I'll take my shot, thanks. With a seriously compromised immune

system, immunizing myself from the flu by getting the flu would prove a deadly solution. :hi:

[SheilaT]

29. If you have a compromised immune system

you are undoubtedly making the best decision for yourself to get a flu shot. I would not suggest otherwise to someone like you. But I do suggest otherwise to those with normal immune systems. It's important to know the difference.

[nadinbrzezinski]

18. Why the head in the sand?

Look we have been overdue for a pandemic for a while

There is more, this head in the sand routine ignroes teh fact that every year the influenza virus MUTATES, which means what you got exposed to last year is NOT the same shit you will be exposed to this year... this is virology 101

Second... the Bird Flu is a whole different animal in how it acts and how it behaves, and it is startig to look like a cousin of the 1918 Epidemic, and if you beleive that was just round the mill influenza, tell that to teh 50 million that died...

Keep your head in the sand

This is the time to DEMAND our system be readied for this, not to hide our heads in the sand. the earth is round you know, and there is plenty of science

By the way the last epdicmeic to affect this planet was 57-58, would you like to tell the 70,000+ americans who died that was just a figment of their imagination?

[SheilaT]

31. I don't think there's a head in the sand

aspect to what I've said.

I repeat. Every single year as far back as I can remember, and I remember the 1957 Asian Flu, thank you very much, there's been a constant and increasing hype that This Year Is The Real Thing.

There is no reason whatsoever to think that the bird flu is amy more likely to mutate into a deadly human to human virus than any other version of the flu in any other year. What I honestly cannot fathom is why this particular strain is being hyped in this particular year.

Those of you who were on this board last year may well remember the hysteria here about the desperate need to get a shot and Oh, my god, there's not enough vaccine to go around (which was true, actually) and guess what? Last year's flu season was unusually mild.

Yes, I do understand quite clearly that fact that no doubt at some point the flu virus will mutate into a rather nasty strain. But I keep on pointing out that there are essential differences between 1918 (the epidemic most commonly pointed to) and now. For one thing, hand washing is much more common. For another, we don't have huge numbers of soldiers crammed into barracks -- most of whom, by the way had literally never been off the farm and so had very naive and unprotected immune systems -- who are then being shipped off around the world just as they've been infected with a particularly nasty strain of the flu.

Remember about a week into the Katrina disaster? Some "experts" were saying that pretty soon we'd see outbreaks of cholera and dysentery. A physician friend of mine pointed out that you only get those diseases if there are carriers of them around to dump those specific organisms into the environment, and her best guess was that few, if any people were in the New Orleans area who were actually infected.

Sometimes a little common sense goes a long way. And sometimes a little common sense is hard to discern amid the hype and hysteria.

[elehhhhna]

16. I got a flu shot once and immediately came down with a HORRIBLE flu

(by immediately I mean three days later). What's up w/that? I don't want another flu shot.

[Bridget Burke]

23. If it was really flu, you had already been exposed.

Did your doctor tell you what strain of flu you had?

[elehhhhna]

28. Good. Thank you. I was afraid it was a reaction to the shot.

No, I didn't see the doc--never got over 101 fever but felt like a train wreck.

[SheilaT]

32. I have heard just enough

stories like this, flu shot and coming down with the flu, that I'm not entirely convinced that in every case the person was exposed before. Or maybe, if you have the lousy timing to be getting ready to come down with the flu, the shot really does make it worse. Too bad there's not some kind of instant blood test to see if you've already been exposed and are ready to get sick.