More deaths from “new flu”
Swine flu spreads; another American dies
Electron micrograph of swine flu virus.
Although present dangers from swine flu may be less severe than originally feared, victims continue to die from the disease as it spreads across the globe. The latest developments place new cases in Australia, China and Japan, while new deaths linked to the disease have occurred in Costa Rica, Mexico and the United States. A Washington state man was the third confirmed casualty in the U.S. Officials stressed that he had a weakened immune system and suffered from an “underlying heart condition.” So far, all U.S. deaths from the virus have occurred in individuals whom officials described as having compromised immune systems.
As of 11 am May 10, the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta put the status of the U.S. outbreak of the disease—which it refers to as “novel influenza A (H1N1) virus”—at 2532 cases spread across 44 states. (As of 12:41 pm today, the CDC updated the number of confirmed cases to 2600. Some press reports have put that number at 2618.)
Japan has reported four cases of H1N1 flu, while globally officials report that more than 4,300 people in 30 countries have become ill since the start of the outbreak. Australia reported its first case—a woman who had been traveling in the United States—but she was said to have made a full recovery.
To keep the swine flu dangers in perspective, commonplace “seasonal” influenza kills approximately 36,000 people annually within the U.S., according to the CDC. So far this year, it reports, 13,000 Americans have died from seasonal influenza. The World Health Organization puts annual global influenza deaths at 250,000 to 500,000, with about three to five million cases of severe illness reported annually. Most deaths associated with influenza in industrialized countries occur among people age 65 or older, according to WHO. That same organization has said that if the current outbreak becomes a pandemic, it might infect about 2 billion people before running its course.
The main concern with the so-called “new flu” is that because it represents a completely new strain, no effective vaccinations have been developed for it. Some experts also fear that because it is a genetic combination of human, avian and swine flu varieties, it might more readily mutate into a highly virulent strain.
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