Pandemic predicted in autumn
One of the UK's leading flu experts has predicted that a pandemic of swine flu is likely to strike Britain in the autumn. Professor John Oxford, an expert on virology at Queen Mary School of Medicine, University of London, says that children going back to school, universities reopening and people going back to work after the summer break would give swine flu the "opportunity" that it needs to spread.
Another fifteen cases of swine flu were confirmed yesterday by the Health Protection Agency, bringing the UK total to 244. One of the cases was in Wales and is believed to be the first there.
But Professor Oxford thinks that many cases are going undetected:
"Already, sporadic cases in the UK have been shown that are not linked with cases that have travelled. That does suggest that the virus is silently spreading around."
However, he said that people should behave as usual, as far as possible, if a pandemic strikes. "What we don't want is people stopping at home and not going to work, because then you have an economic problem on top of a pandemic," 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 by coughing into the crux of your arm."
Professor Oxford said that in the next few months, global health officials will be keeping a close eye on what happens to the H1N1 swine flu virus in countries like Australia and South Africa. The southern hemisphere is entering its winter and the peak period for flu. On Friday, the World Health Organization reported that Australia has had 147 confirmed cases; Argentina has had 37; and none so far in South Africa.
What happens in the southern hemisphere in the coming months will be a good indicator of how the virus will behave in Europe and North America later this year. There would be particular concern if H1N1 mutated substantially to become a more virulent illness. Thankfully, there are no signs of that yet.
The Australian Science Media Centre is an excellent resource for anyone wanting to know what experts are thinking about the spread of the virus there. The Science Media Centre in London has lots of reliable specialist comments on flu and a host of other issues.
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I wish the BBC would check the facts before telling everyone they were going to die from swine flu or, after almost nothing happens for two weeks, tell us that we are all going to die in the autumn.
If a million people had died in Mexico we would have something to worry about, but as it is this flu seems no worse than normal flu, even though it has an unusual origin.
Unusual does not equate to dangerous and I wish that the relative risks had been far better explored before the Beeb had decided to follow the herd and jump off the deep end.
Thousands of people die of flu every year, whilst millions die of diahorrhea so perhaps you could instead whip up some hysteria where it is 100% justified and could genuinely help to reduce the number of preventable deaths in the world.
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I have not been to Mexico. I know nobody who has - as far as I am aware. I have developed a throat problem over this past weekend (30/31 May 2009). I am losing my voice - coupled with sneezing and running nose but no fever temperatures. I am still going to work.I have an appetite. I do not think it is flu - I have had it - in Royal Air Force many years ago -temperature of 102 etc. Should I get it checked out? I do not normally go to Doctors.
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I'm trying to remember the government predictions recently circulated. I believe they predicted that 25%-50% of the population would catch swine flu at some stage - probably next winter. Of these, 0.25-1% would die. So the scenario for swine flu related deaths in the UK is: Anywwhere between 37,500 and 300,000 deaths. I presume these numbers were a prediction for the next 12 months.
I don't believe this is reason to panic. It is, however, reason to have some concern. One would expect hospitals and health care to get very stretched, probably overstretched, in six month's time. One would expect some level of disruption. The scariest thing: One would expect to experience a bereavement in the next year. This flu is not the equivalent of the Great War - but neither is it just the equivalent of a Heat Wave, in terms of its likely impact.
I find advice telling people to sneeze hygienically stupid: It does not benefit the sneezer, and it only might benefit the sneezed at people. I don't want advice on "how to keep your illness to yourself" - I want advice on "how to not get ill, or minimise the impact if you do".
If I were the government, I would advise people to try and keep their immune system strong this year, at least until the flu season has passed. If that means healthier living and less excess for a year, then so be it. I'd rather catch the flu after spending six months eating and drinking sensibly, than after weeks of poor nutrition and binge drinking.
As for Tamilflu - I would like to know how bad the side effects are (and the likely mortality from those) before I'd consider taking it.
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We certainly do not want to advise people to stay at home when sick with the flu when they could be out shopping and helping the economy. Money first, citizens second..we need to understand the priorities.
N1H1 can mutate as it spreads and become resisitent or become more lethal. World travel makes the problem difficult to contain and the incubation period adds to the difficulties. We are in a world with a severe economic crisis, global warming and poor air quality and suspect pulbic health systems.......and now the bad news.
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I´m sorry, but I don´t see the sense in advising people to go on about their routine activities, when they have the flu, swine type or otherwise. Stay at home, rest up and get over the virus. Don´t go out and infect other people you come in contact with, that is irresponsible.
I have always followed this advice, thereby sparing others from suffering your fate. I would have thought this to be a common sense approach. Now we get various types of advise from the medical field, the media, the economists etc., all telling us to carry on as usual. That´s just plain stupid advise, sorry!!
I work in retail, other family members in the health industry and one thing we all agree upon is, if you are infected with the cold, the flu or any other affliction, such as the plague, measles,small pox etc, do us a favor, stay at home...we don´t want it either!!!
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It seems that a lot of people have misunderstood what the word "pandemic" means. It just means a disease outbreak that has spread around the world, not doomsday. The word describes the spread of a disease, not its lethality. By saying that a swine flu pandemic is imminent neither the BBC nor the government or universities are guilty of scare-mongering. People who accuse them of being so are guilty of being too lazy to use a dictionary or check the WHO website.
By the way, I'm a virologist and I'm sticking with calling it swine flu rather than H1N1 because it has been shown to be mostly from swine lineages. There are so many circulating H1N1 strains of human origin that calling it swine flu is about as helpful as telling a policeman that you were hit by a silver car, instead of a Toyota Corolla with licence plate ABC 1234.
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Oops sorry, I meant "...that calling it H1N1 is about as helpful..."
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As the global problem of 'swine flu' develops, those countries at a more advanced stage of infection, have learned a few new things. Mr Fergus Walsh could at least bring some of the new learning into the discussion. It should not be up to us, the bloggers and twitters to spell out necessary changes to government and populations that are needed to reduce the speed of infection to a manageable rate.
One of the ideas put forward is the protection of agency workers, to enable them to go off sick if they become ill. Many agency workers have to take risks and work whether they are ill or not, because they are not covered by the usual protection that a regular employee enjoys. A regular employee can take comfort in the fact that they know which days they will be working, have holiday pay, have normal sickness benefits etc etc. An agency worker is called in to cover a worker who has gone off SICK.
The government has already advised certain work groups to keep a list of agencies to whom they can get cover when their workers go off sick. Should there now be greater protection for agency workers? After all agency workers help out when there is no-one else available, and without them, some key work areas could find themselves seriously compromised.
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Our current Australian experience may relieve your fears... Our 14 year old daughter was confirmed today as having had Swine Flu / H1N1 (you choose!) last week. Very mild symptoms which would have been missed if I hadn't found out by chance that she'd had contact with a confirmed case at school. That was last Thursday. So far neither my husband nor I have any symptoms and our daughter has fully recovered. She was given Tamiflu to hasten recovery, but we would prefer not to take it ourselves as we don't have any symptoms and want to build up our own immunity in case this flu returns in a nastier form. Our family has been quarantined, but the 'contain' policy is being reviewed as more schools are closing and more cases confirmed. Victoria (where we live) has the majority of cases in Australia - almost 400 here alone. My suggestion is to be cautious and let common sense prevail. There is a lot you can do to prevent the spread of flu, but it's proven to be more of an inconvenience than a threat so far.
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Thanks to drmattprescott for your comments. Have a good look in the blog and on the BBC coverage and I'm confident that you won't find any hysterical claims from correspondents about swine flu.
If you watched the Six or Ten o'clock news on BBC1 on Friday you would have seen me do a report about the threat of drug-resistant malaria. I have also reported several times on HIV/AIDS, TB and child mortality - from a variety of causes - including diarrhoea.
You are quite right to say that thousands of people die from flu every year - the WHO global estimate is 250,000-500,000. I have pointed this out several times. Death estimates for flu are not simple but it's thought that between one and two million people died in each of the last two pandemics, many times more than with seasonal flu.
Clearly that is not as many as die from malaria, TB and HIV/AIDS, but a pandemic, even of largely mild illness, would have a huge impact both in the UK and internationally. In Britain, hundreds of thousands of people might be off work during the peak periods of infection and that would have a major economic and social impact - far more than with seasonal flu.
Hi lawyer_jake. I can't give personal health guidance on this blog - not least because I'm not medically qualified. If you are ill you should probably seek medical advice of some kind, via NHS Direct, or NHS 24 in Scotland. It's generally not a good idea for people with coughs, colds or flu to take the virus down to their GP surgery. Hope you feel better soon.
Thanks for your comments Ikarus. An earlier post "Explaining flu" gives you the predictions about mortality in the UK in a pandemic. Like all drugs, Tamiflu has potential side-effects, nausea being a common complaint.
RE Comment 5: Let me clear up any confusion about what Professor Oxford's comments. He is advising that healthy people should carry on life as normal, in the event of a pandemic, although they should follow sensible hygiene guidance. But sick people should stay at home and keep the flu virus to themselves.
RE Comments 6 and 7. It's interesting that the CDC and WHO stopped calling it swine flu sme time ago. The CDC goes for "novel influenza A (H1N1)" and the WHO "influenza A(H1N1) infection". Both are a bit of a mouthful for when I'm reportng on TV or radio. I tend to call it H1N1 swine flu when I mention it first and then shorten that to swine flu or H1N1 virus afterwards.
RE Comment 9, thanks very much for getting in touch. It's very good to know what is happening on the ground in Australia and to hear that your daughter is ok. Please let me know how she gets on with the Tamiflu and whether she suffers any of the reported side-effects such as nausea (which seem to be very mild). I'd be interested to get some first-hand accounts of the disease and the treatment.
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Ikarus wrote: "One would expect to experience a bereavement in the next year", which, based on the current evidence is surely grossly over-stating the dangers, even assuming a figure at the higher end of the projected figures (that is a 1% fatality).
You say "no reason to panic" but in the next breath seem to be saying "people can expect one of their loved ones to die within the next year from swine flu"!
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Thanks for your comments MajorGallagher. Please point out to me where I suggest that someone close to you is going to die from swine flu in the next year? I have never intended to imply that. Remember that "pandemic" means simply a global epidemic of an infectious disease. It does not imply severity. Thankfully, the vast majority of cases of swine flu so far have been mild. At present you need to have underlying health conditions or be very unlucky to be struck down severely ill with the virus. But the case of the 45-year-old man in hospital in Paisley - who had been otherwise healthy - shows that H1N1 is not always a mild disease.
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Fergus, you misread my post - I was responding to the comment 3. above from Ikarus.
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Apologies MajorGallagher. I did indeed misread it!
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Latest news from Melbourne, Australia - the Swine Flu capital of the world! Victora currently has 1,011 confirmed cases of H1N1- the highest number per capita in the world. The Victorian government has moved from a Contain to a modified Sustain Phase of its influenza plan. Here's the address of the Press Release outlining the revised quarantine regulations - http://humanswineflu.health.vic.gov.au/downloads/media/media-release030609.pdf
No reports of serious illness here so far, with the majority of cases being young people aged between 5 and 18. Our daughter had no side effects from taking Tamiflu, but I read in the weekend paper about overseas findings of suicide tendencies in some young people after taking it. Neither my husband nor I had any flu symptoms at all despite being in close contact with our daughter the whole time. I understand that the authorities would only test for H1N1 if there had been contact with a confirmed case, even if someone had flu like symptoms. Consequently I heard of children who were ill, but not tested as there was no known contact with a confirmed case. The authorities in Victoria have struggled to deal with this epidemic and it's easy to see how a pandemic of a more serious nature could claim many lives world wide.
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To kockatoo: your point about IF it were more serious (i.e. deadly) is rather scary! Thank goodness only a few hundred thousand (or should that be a million or so?) may die... that way governments can justify giving only lip-service to the problem.
At the end of the day there are some far more serious health problems worldwide so why bother about yet another one which is minor in comparison anyway???
I pity my childrens generation... they are going to face far far more serious problems and will have to make extraordinarily difficult decisions once world (i.e. non-localized) water and food problems start happening every year. i.e. they will simply have to say "No, we only have enough to save ourselves!"
But, on a positive note, the ONLY realistic way to achieve any significant reduction in CO2 is for major global population reduction... so, we need - yes NEED - either a series of high-mortality pandemics, a high-mortality war (or two), or mass starvation. But, lets be realistic, the most politically acceptable is, of course, an "uncontrollable" pandemic. It will happen... world governments just wish it were sooner rather than later (that is IF global warming is accepted as a serious problem by governments in the first place... which it appears not to be).
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Oh my GOD! I have just realized that a mad (or is that merely ultra-sane and cold blooded?) government may now develop a deadly flu specifically for this purpose.... and then blame terrorists! You will note that it is already being promulgated as being a terrorist threat, so the ground is being laid!!!! Good thing I do not believe in conspiracy theories....
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