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Bacteria that cause pneumonia and meningitis are only able to spread when individuals are infected with flu, says a scientist reporting at the Society for General Microbiology's Spring Conference in Harrogate. The work could have implications for the management of influenza pandemics and could help reduce incidence of pneumococcal infections in very young children, who are more susceptible to disease. Streptococcus pneumoniae normally lives harmlessly in the nasal passage. Up to 80% of young children carry the bacterium in their nose. It is already known that if a colonized individual is infected with influenza virus, the bacterium is more likely...

The joke that's going around is that the Mayans got it wrong: The world is ending this year, not 2012. Here's the lates sign of that. A superbug is spreading around America, and has hit Southern California. LA Times: A dangerous drug-resistant bacterium has spread to patients in Southern California, according to a study by Los Angeles County public health officials. More than 350 cases of the Carbapenem-Resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae, or CRKP, have been reported at healthcare facilities in Los Angeles County, mostly among elderly patients at skilled-nursing and long-term care facilities, according to a study by Dr. Dawn Terashita,...

How can this happen in 2011? I was just talking with him 3 weeks ago about possibly going bass fishing with him in Mexico this Spring. Seems he checked into the hospital about a week ago complaining of respiratory troubles after contracting the flu. They released him shortly after. He posted on his Facebook page at that time about how it sucks being sick, and how good it would be just to walk 20 feet without gasping for breath. 2 days later, hie son and ex-wife found him dead in bed. I am stunned. He was in good health. No...

So how many people do you know who are sick with the latest round of cough/flu? And have been for weeks, if not months? About a third of my friends and family are. I was, but I catch just about everything - and then recover quickly thanks to an overactive immune system (which has problems of its own). So let's go conspiracy theory here: Are we in the middle of a bio attack? After all, I cannot remember when this many people I know spread around the US and two continents were sick the same way this long. But decades...

A team at Oxford University has had success testing a vaccine that can neuter any strain of flu virus. Photograph: Science Photo Library The treatment ... targets a different part of the flu virus to traditional vaccines, meaning it does not need to be expensively reformulated every year to match the most prevalent virus that is circulating the world. Developed by a team led by Dr Sarah Gilbert at Oxford's Jenner Institute, the vaccine targets proteins inside the flu virus that are common across all strains, instead of those that sit on the virus's external coat, which are liable...

"consideration of antiviral treatment for any previously healthy, non high-risk symptomatic outpatient with confirmed or suspected influenza, based upon clinical judgment, if treatment can be initiated within 48 hours of illness onset." The above comment is included in the recent CDC health alert on influenza antiviral treatment and diagnostic tests. This January 14, 2011 alert follows a significant outbreak of H1N1 in the UK and reports of increased H1N1 activity in the northern hemisphere. Initial reports from the UK indicated most fatal cases were young adults without underlying conditions. Subsequent reports have focused on patients with underlying conditions, but the...

Convalescent plasma therapy—using plasma from patients who have recovered from an infection to treat those with the same infection—has been used to treat multiple diseases. However, the efficacy of this treatment in patients with severe 2009 H1N1 influenza is unknown. A study published in the February 15 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases suggests that convalescent plasma may reduce the death rate in patients severely ill with this type of influenza. (Please see below for a link to the embargoed study online.) From September 2009 through June 2010, patients from a hospital cluster in Hong Kong with severe 2009 H1N1 infection...

Cold weather really does spread flu 12:19 19 October 2007 by Debora MacKenzie Scientists have finally confirmed what your mother knew all along - that flu spreads best in cold, dry weather. As the first few cases of the northern hemisphere's annual flu epidemic are trickling in this week, scientists may finally know why winter is flu season. It appears the virus lasts longer in cold, dry air, and our sluggish, cold-weather mucus cannot clear it out. Astonishingly it has taken until the publication of research this week to settle the basic question about how flu spreads, and why it...

[EMBARGOED FOR JAN. 5, 2011] For those infected with the 2009 pandemic influenza A (H1N1) virus, extreme obesity was a powerful risk factor for death, according to an analysis of a public health surveillance database. In a study to be published in the February 1, 2011, issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, researchers associated extreme obesity with a nearly three-fold increased odds of death from 2009 H1N1 influenza. Half of Californians greater than 20 years of age hospitalized with 2009 H1N1 were obese. (Please see below for a link to the study online.) Data from 500 adults hospitalized with H1N1 in...

Intensive care units across Britain are almost full as the NHS faces one of the worst flu outbreaks in a decade. Some hospitals have only one or two life-support machines left and critically ill patients are being transferred by ambulance to other trusts.... >snip< Senior doctors report that they are seeing the highest number of flu cases in more than 20 years and expect the situation to worsen over the coming weeks.

OKLAHOMA CITY -- When Lesley Ley, an Oklahoma City-based practical nurse heard that a national company was hiring nurses to administer flu shots in a local mall, she jumped at the chance to make some extra money prior to a trip. Ley said she first became aware of the flu clinic, to be set up at Penn Square Mall, in September. She provided a copy of an email that was circulated and stated: “WellCheck will be operating its 2010 seasonal flu shot program in 150 malls in 35 states.” The email was sent out on Sept. 3, 2010 by a...

I just got my flu shot on Tuesday and for the past couple of days I have been lightheaded and having mild nasuea. I checked and discovered that the swine flu strain was included in this years vaccine, even though I asked the nurse if this was for the seasonal flu only. This is also the first time I have ever had a reaction to a vaccine.

The Seasonal Flu Vaccine A seasonal vaccine is distributed routinely every year. •Unlike last flu season, when you needed to get two vaccines, the 2009 H1N1 and the seasonal vaccine, this flu season you only need the seasonal vaccine. •The 2010-2011 flu vaccine protects against an influenza A H3N2 virus, an influenza B virus and the 2009 H1N1 virus that caused so much illness last season.

I was checking around online to find a convenient place nearby to get an annual flu shot, as is my habit, but so far, every place offering shots this year I have gone to is stating something along the lines of this: "The H1N1 component is included in this year's Seasonal Influenza Immunization." They don't offer a "plain vanilla" flu shot, so to speak, that is, a regular flu shot, WITHOUT any H1N1. If I am unable to find a flu shot offered without H1N1 included, then I will be skipping it this year. My wife is a health care...

Or will your decision be based more on the premise that you have a right to dictate what happens to your body? You may think that your freedoms are being impinged by the mandatory part of the flu shot. What if the mandatory shot to save your job turned into a mandatory shot for your entire family in order to save your job?

In early June of this year, European countries were strongly criticizing the WHO over the handling of the H1N1 flu. They accused the WHO of exaggerating the threat posed by the H1N1 flu. They also said that the WHO had been influenced by the pharmaceutical companies.

Previously I have highlighted the benefits vitamin D has with regard to improving the immune response and helping keep infections such as flu at bay. It has been mooted that the upsurge in viral infections during the winter is connected with the generally lower vitamin D levels at this time. The traditional view is that winter infections are due to “indoor crowding.”However, research indicates that flu epidemics do not occur in the summer in crowded workplaces despite the presence of the flu virus around people who should be susceptible to infection. This is based on research by the Centers for...

Grassley says he is worried about wasting tax dollars. The United States still has 71 million doses of H1N1 swine flu vaccine that have not been used, but it is not yet time to throw them out, the federal government said on Monday. States and other providers should hang on to the vaccine and continue to offer them to people until drug companies can start distributing seasonal vaccine for the coming influenza season in the autumn, said Health and Human Services Department spokesman Bill Hall. Senator Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance committee, released a letter on...

Although experts are not sure to what degree, seasonal flu cases and deaths dropped in Maryland and nationwide this year, during the height of the novel H1N1 pandemic. While flu cases are not perfectly tracked, epidemiologists believe the decreases were caused by increased health campaigning and vaccination rates, a weaker seasonal flu strain, and other causes. Epidemiologists all over the world think next flu season's primary strain will mutate around H1N1, or swine flu. Although officials and health professionals do not know how strong the 2010-2011 flu season will be, they are encouraging vaccination. "Overall flu deaths are down this...

(NaturalNews) I remember the H1N1 "swine flu" season of 2009 very well. People were rushing out to get vaccinated, scared half to death by the mainstream media which was pushing false reports that the swine flu would kill tens of millions of people and that only a vaccine could save you. The CDC and health authorities were pushing a double-barreled vaccine strategy that demanded people get both a seasonal flu shot as well as an H1N1 pandemic flu shot. Those who questioned the sensibility of vaccines for fighting the flu were attacked as "baby killers" for not kow-towing to the...