Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
significant number of cases had been reported worldwide, with numbers rising and
at levels that many considered alarming. (“As of 27 December 2009, worldwide,
more than 208 countries and overseas territories or communities have reported
laboratory confirmed cases of pandemic influenza H1N1 2009, including at least
12,220 deaths.”
*
) The WHO subsequently raised the outbreak to a full pandemic
level, Phase 6, indicating a global pandemic was underway.
Note that every community already suffers significant impact from
seasonal flu.
,
a common respiratory illness transmitted from person to person. Although many
people have some immunity to this illness, and vaccines are available annually,
each year in the United States alone an average of 36,000 deaths occur as a result
of seasonal influenza. These deaths, along with more than 200,000 U.S. hospital-
izations and more than $10 billion in U.S. economic cost,
25
accompany more than
one-quarter to one-half million deaths worldwide annually.
26
This toll should lead
to a heightened awareness of hygiene principals—principals that would be effective
for not only a pandemic but also seasonal flu. Unfortunately, some say our culture
has adopted a
laissez-faire
approach to this disease and to measures effective in pre-
venting its transmission.
There are encouraging developments, however. Recently, public service an-
nouncements (PSAs) and other media communications have been emphasizing the
importance of hygiene for limiting transmission of infectious disease (e.g., sug-
gesting to citizens that they wash their hands regularly, taking the washing time
necessary to sing the tune “Happy Birthday” twice). Although it has been suggested
that the public had been suffering from “information fatigue” as a result of exten-
sive coverage of the Avian Flu pandemic, and that subsequently media reports had
waned, recent coverage had again risen, particularly as a result of the Swine Flu
pandemic. This coverage can be helpful in preparing the public for pandemics, but
only if the messages are clear and easily understood.
Numerous interesting new tools and techniques related to pandemics are being
introduced—not only to the health care community and emergency preparedness
professionals, but also to the public. For example, keying on Internet searches,
Google's Flu Trends looks at the “relative popularity of a slew of flu-related search
terms to determine where in the U.S. flu outbreaks may be occurring.” “What's
exciting about Flu Trends is that it lets anybody—epidemiologists, health officials,
moms with sick children—learn about the current flu activity level in their own
*
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “Pandemic (H1N1) 2009—update
81,” http://www.who.int/csr/don/2009_12_30/en/index.html. As of May 1, 2009, 331 cases
were reported in 11 countries, with 10 resultant deaths. By May 10, 2009, only nine days
later, the reported cases had risen dramatically, to 4379, with 49 deaths. (World Health
Organization [WHO], http://www.who.int/csr/don/2009_05_10/en/index.html.)
