Study: Face Masks Seem to Protect Against Flu
MONDAY, Aug. 3, 2009 (Health.com) — From Mexico to China, people around the world have worn face masks to protect against swine flu, also known as the H1N1 virus. The problem? Experts could never say for sure if such masks actually help you stay healthy.
Now, the largest study to date on the subject suggests they do. When sick people and their families wear surgical face masks and wash their hands within the first 36 hours of symptoms, healthy family members are indeed less likely to get seasonal flu, researchers say. They think the results may apply to H1N1 as well. Read More
Flu Shot May Be Less Effective in Those With Lupus
THURSDAY, July 30 (HealthDay News) — The two prime means by which the seasonal influenza vaccine activates the immune system against the virus appear to be diminished in people with lupus, a new study finds.
According to Dutch researchers led by Albert Holvast, of the University of Groningen, the human immune system goes on alert against the seasonal flu virus after vaccination in two ways. First, it generates antibodies specifically reacting to the flu virus, and secondly, it primes certain immune T-cells to respond to the flu bug. Read More
Pregnant Women, Health-Care Workers Top Swine Flu Vaccine Candidates
WEDNESDAY, July 29 (HealthDay News) — Women who are pregnant, children 6 months and older and health-care workers should all get top priority when the H1N1 swine flu vaccine arrives this fall, a U.S. government advisory panel recommended late Wednesday.
Added to that list of first-line recipients are parents and caregivers of infants, non-elderly adults with risky medical problems and young adults ages 19 to 24, according to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The panel met in Atlanta to review data for setting swine flu vaccine priorities. Read More
Prioritize Pregnant Women to Get Swine Flu Shot, Experts Say
WEDNESDAY, July 29 (HealthDay News) — As U.S. officials meet Wednesday to decide who should get priority for potentially scarce H1N1 swine flu shots this fall, the danger the virus poses to pregnant women should vault that group to the top of the list, experts say.
A panel convened by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to release its recommendations on vaccine distribution priorities later on Wednesday. Beyond that, the first trials of a vaccine against the new H1N1 swine flu are set to begin soon, and experts hope for the first batch of viable shots to be distributed by October, if all goes well. Read More
CDC Panel to Recommend Who Should Get Swine Flu Shot
TUESDAY, July 28 (HealthDay News) — With the first trials of a vaccine against the new H1N1 swine flu set to begin shortly, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will convene a panel of experts Wednesday to recommend a priority list of candidates for the vaccine.
Those recommendations will assume that a safe and effective vaccine will be available by October in sufficient quantity to start a mass vaccination program in the United States. If all goes well, the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine should be known by late August or September, federal officials said. Read More
Save Swine Flu Drugs for Younger Patients, Study Urges
TUESDAY, July 28 (HealthDay News) — Antiviral drug treatment of swine flu may be wasted on the elderly and should be reserved for young people, suggest researchers who created a model of the effect of antiviral treatment on the spread of the H1N1 virus.
If the current swine flu pandemic behaves like the 1918 flu, antiviral drugs would not significantly reduce death rates among people older than 65 and, in fact, might cause the H1N1 virus to develop increased drug resistance, according to Stefano Merler, of the Bruno Kessler Foundation in Italy, and his colleagues. Read More
Swine Flu Could Eventually Affect 40% of Americans: CDC
FRIDAY, July 24 (HealthDay News) — The H1N1 swine flu could end up affecting as many as 40 percent of Americans, if one includes workers who stay home to care for people who contract the illness, U.S. health officials said Friday.
The projection from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is based on the influenza pandemic in 1957, when almost 70,000 people in the United States died from the flu. Read More
U.S. Expects 160 Million Doses of Swine Flu Vaccine by October
THURSDAY, July 23 (HealthDay News) — U.S. officials hope to have 160 million doses of injectable swine flu vaccine on hand by October, with more doses coming in the form of a nasal spray.
Since immunization is expected to depend on each person getting two doses spread a month apart, the amount of vaccine will still only cover a fraction of the population, but more is expected to arrive in the following months, the Associated Press reported Thursday. Read More
U.S. Swine Flu Vaccine Trials Set to Begin
WEDNESDAY, July 22 (HealthDay News) — The United States is readying its first human trials of an experimental vaccine to protect against the H1N1 swine flu virus, officials announced Wednesday.
Two possible vaccines will be tested at eight institutions around the country under the auspices of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). Read More
Safety of Swine Flu Vaccine to Face Tough Scrutiny
TUESDAY, July 21 (HealthDay News) — A high-level U.S. government decision in 1976 to vaccinate 43 million people against swine flu backfired — badly.
Not only did the dreaded outbreak never materialize (illness never spread beyond 240 soldiers stationed at Fort Dix, N.J.) but some 500 Americans who did get vaccinated came down with a rare neurodegenerative condition called Guillain-Barre syndrome, which many experts believe was linked to the shot. Twenty-five of those 500 people died.
Now U.S. health officials are considering a fall immunization campaign that could involve an unprecedented 600 million doses of vaccine for the currently circulating H1N1 swine flu vaccine. Read More
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