--- Gary Nunn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> John wrote
> > In all of the news reports, they keep talking
> about the
> > number of people who have died from the flu so far
> and how
> > they are all children. As a parent of small
> children of my own, does any one
> > know what age those kids are? How concerned
> should we be about this?
> My Kids are 9 and 2.5, and I had both of them
> vaccinated last week. My 9
> year old daughter has mild asthma and is considered
> high risk. My 2 year
> old is supposed to get a second shot in 30 days, but
> I suspect that they
> will be out of vaccination by then.
>
> I looked over the news reports and the CDC website,
> and although they
> are somewhat vague, it appears that it is primarily
> the high risk
> children that have the highest mortality rate. By
> high risk I mean kids
> with severe asthma, suppressed immunity, less than
> 24 months old, etc.
> Although, there have been reports of perfectly
> healthy 10 year olds kids
> that didn't survive, but I really think that
> occurrence is very rare.
Colorado has had 9 documented flu-related child
deaths, and 1 or 2 more are still being investigated;
ages ranged from 22 months to ~15yo. Almost half of
these children had no known underlying illnesses,
while the others had various chronic conditions such
as asthma, diabetes and cancer. One complication that
seems to be more of a problem this year is secondary
infection (pneumonia, mostly) with
*community-acquired* methicillin-resistant
_Staphalococcus aureus_[MRSA]; this used to be
primarily a hospital-acquired infection, so those
without hospital exposure weren't at risk. MRSA
infections have to be treated with different
antibiotics than most primary care docs would
ordinarily use for bronchitis or pneumonia -- they're
more expensive, and some have to be given IV rather
than orally. Here is one article with links:
http://www.9news.com/storyfull.aspx?storyid=21811
(Because of CO's high rate of flu & related deaths,
most of the local stations have put up doctor-assisted
sites/info for the community.)
Children, especially the very young, frequently have
atypical symptoms as well: rather than a high fever
with severe chills and body aches, they might have
hoarse breathing, tummy ache with diarrhea, or a bad
headache. They also seem to get dehydrated more
easily (in a baby or toddler, a parent would notice
decreased need for diaper changes). Since children
have smaller airways than adults, and a smaller body
volume, they do not tolerate clogged airways or
dehydration as well (well, it's a little more complex
than that, with children's immature immune systems a
big factor, but you get the picture).
For a healthy child over 5yo, an alternative to the
shot is the nasally-administered vaccine (it's called
FluMist); this is an attenuated live virus rather than
a killed virus as in the shot, so cannot be given to a
child with a compromised immune system. It is also
more expensive than the regular shot. Of course, this
year, there is a slight mismatch between the viral
strains used to prepare the vaccine and one of the
actual variety that's going around: the Fujian
variant. Still, most experts think that getting the
vaccine will result in a less-severe infection even
with the mismatch.
This is the CDC site, with multiple links and FAQs,
including info on the nasal vaccine and maps outlining
cases across the country (I think most states have set
up websites on the flu, but you can see what's been
reported to the CDC here):
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/
To add to the confusion, there is apparently at least
one other respiratory virus going around that can be
confused with the flu; there are laboratory tests that
can identify flu infection in less than an hour (with
reasonable accuracy for such rapidity, but there can
be up to 30% false-negative rate). Here is the CDC
site on diagnosis:
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/professionals/labdiagnosis.htm
For reference, the flu and its complications kill from
20,000 to 36,000 people in the US every year;
periodically a pandemic will sweep the world killing
millions. (Frex the 1917-8 pandemic, which might have
been a "fusion" virus rather than the pure human
influenza virus; I've seen research leaning towards an
avian or swine flu "pass-through." When humans and
animals live in close proximity under poor sanitation
& hygeine, some viruses 'jump' from one species to
another: if an individual, human or animal, has an
active infection with more than one influenza virus,
there can be some mixing of genes, and the resultant
virus might be even more virulent or communicable than
the standard varieties. Of course, most such fusions
probably are _less_ hardy, and unable to pass through
one species into another, which is one of the reasons
we don't have more pandemics. This is why the WHO and
CDC pounced so hard on the SARS infection; many
epidimiologists think we are past due for a bad
pandemic.)
I couldn't find any hard data on
