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That's really awful and tragic for her and her loved ones, but I'm sure the local news and CNN will be blaring this loudly as a sign that we're all going to die. I half-expect the local TV to say, \"So Joe, has anyone died from swine flu in (local area) yet?\" \"No Fred, but we're hoping that will change soon. Meanwhile, here's what to do if you're hard of hearing and contract swine flu...\"
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Don't panic.
There's nothing to panic about at this point. It said she had other chronic health problems, so the flu (any flu) could have been really serious for her.
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@HogwartsAlum: My youngest daughter was diagnosed with pneumonia; no doubt her asthma and all the cold and rainy weather we have had here the last was why. So yes, underlying health problems will make a person at risk with any type of flu. This is why nursing homes give as many residents as possible the flu vaccine every year.
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@nursetim: as an old asthmatic man I can sympathize with the little tyke - hope she's better soon.
Out of curiosity - if she's using Flovent, do most foods have a coppery/metalic taste to her?
@nursetim:
Oh yeah. That's why they recommend flu shots for elderly, youngsters and immune-compromised patients. The flu can really rack you out if you're already sick.
I hope your daughter is feeling better soon.
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@HogwartsAlum: And we don't know how old she was, either. The elderly, regardless of health, are more susceptible to illness.
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So when are we going to start reporting all \"regular\" flu deaths?
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@nakedscience: As soon as they can turn the name into something catchier. \"Homo sapien flu\" isn't very catching, nor is \"human flu\". I prefer either \"meat-bag flu\" or \"coffin-stuffer flu\".
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I seem to recall that a few years back they did just that; talking about the normal flu as if it were some great epidemic come to kill us all even though it was no big deal again a season later.
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In the time it took to write this article, 1200 people died of regular flu.
The 1976 Swine Flu Epidemic was much worse, primarily because 500 people became ill from the vaccination and 25 died.
@kylere: 25% of the population of the United States, 54,508,750 people, got the swine flu shot in 1976. 0.0009% of them became ill, and 0.000045% died. I still think this is worse.
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@hwyengr: Uh no they didn't. Show your source. One person died from the actual swine flu who was in the army and got the flu at an army base, the other 25 died from the vaccination.
On February 5, 1976, in the United States an army recruit at Fort Dix said he felt tired and weak. He died the next day and four of his fellow soldiers were later hospitalized. Two weeks after his death, health officials announced that the cause of death was a new strain of swine flu. The strain, a variant of H1N1, is known as A/New Jersey/1976 (H1N1). It was detected only from January 19 to February 9 and did not spread beyond Fort Dix.[26]
There were reports of Guillain-Barré syndrome, a paralyzing neuromuscular disorder, affecting some people who had received swine flu immunizations. This syndrome is a rare side-effect of modern influenza vaccines, with an incidence of about one case per million vaccinations.
Overall, about 500 cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS), resulting in death from severe pulmonary complications for 25 people, which, according to Dr. P. Haber, were probably caused by an immunopathological reaction to the 1976 vaccine.
@hi: ugg sorry, I misread the above post... I thought he said that many people got the swine flu.. not the shot. :) sorry!
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@kylere: Don't forget the additional casualties when the reanimated corpses of the swine flu victims ravaged a local mall.
This just in: dying woman dies. Media foaming at mouth.
I'm not worried if a few people die. I'm only going to start worrying if the dead start moving around again.
@Mike_Hawk: you have the fence built yet? I do, still working on the towers though.
Teaching the kids about head shots was great too!!
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I thought there was already one death in the US from it...
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@tbonekatz: Still makes the first line of the story incorrect. The first victim in the U.S. to die from swine flu was that infant, so far as we know.
Reminds me of my newspaper days in the early 90s -- we had a headline about a helicopter crash in Bosnia that blared \"Three Americans Die in Helicopter Crash.\" Problem was, there were 11 people on that downed copter, and they all died. I remember bitching at the editorial meeting that it was disrespectful to act as though the lives of the Americans were more important than the others who died.
Well I guess you could make the argument that the deaths of the Americans are more relevant to American newspaper readers than deaths of people from other countries.
I'm sure Bosnians would care less about the three dying Americans than the 8 dead Bosnians (assuming that the other dead were in fact Bosnians).
Not surprised. But a lot more people die because of more mundane reasons.
THIS IS NOT THE FIRST US DEATH. The 23 month old was the first, how can the article say \"This woman was the first in the US to die from swine flu\" and also say \"Oh yea, and that 23 month old kid last week\"? How many firsts can there be?
Here's the article in abridged form:
\"Texas health officials have confirmed the first death of a United States resident with swine flu.
...the flu victim was a woman who lived in Cameron County...
...she died earlier this week.
Last week, a boy from Mexico City died at a Houston hospital, marking the first swine flu death in the United States.\"
I'm so confused.
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@Erin Cummins: read what you wrote again:
Texas health officials have confirmed the first death of a United States resident with swine flu...
Last week, a boy from Mexico City died at a Houston hospital, marking the first swine flu death in the United States.
@Erin Cummins: I read what you posted and it seemed pretty easy to understand. Maybe you should read more slowly?
There are really good reasons to worry about the Swine Flu, but it mostly has to do with the way in which it spreads, the quickness in which it spreads, and potential mutations. On the macro level, this flu is a very scary thing. The media's selling of YOU COULD DIE TO THIS on the micro level is pretty irrational and dumb, but I guess the media always tailors itself to its audience.
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@Blinky987: My mom teaches at a junior high that's been closed for five days for a confirmed case of swine flu. But the bigger issue is that the day before they shut down for the case the CDC identified (Patient Zero, we'll call her, for this school) they had more than 100 kids out, too sick to come to school, doubtless (health officials say) ALSO with the swine flu.
None of these kids is (probably) going to die. But because this is a NEW strain of flu, none of these kids has any immunity to it. None of them have had a \"cousin\" strain. It's not that it'll kill them or even do much besides make them miserable for a week or so ... it's that because there's no immunity or prior exposure in the population, it can spread with astonishing rapidity and sicken large groups at once. 100 kids home is getting close to the threshhold where they close the school ANYWAY. In a normal flu season, that simply doesn't happen. 100 kids may get the flu over the course of the season, but not all at once, and many people will have immunity.
So even leaving aside potential mutations and other scientific scariness, there's the plain old problem that a NEW strain, even if mild, can propagate through the population very quickly and hit large groups all at once ... which means a lot of these kids' parents can't go to work. They'll miss between 5 and 10 days of school (and they already missed 3 for snow and 2 for flooding, so they'll run out of emergency makeup days). If it were to race through, say, the NYSE trading floor, or a hospital, or a police station, that would be a serious disruption of normal life. Not dire by any means, but definitely expensive and definitely inconvenient.
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@Eyebrows McGee (on Twitter: LPetelle): Are the 100 kids verified? Or just teacher-to-teacher rumor? How many of those 'sick' kids are kids whose parents are keeping them out of school due to panic and fear? There is a lot of missing info here. Please forgive me if I don't take your mom's word for it.
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@bilups: It's going to be hard to tell, because they're no longer interested in sampling the non-hospitalized. Illinois officially now is considered to have 82 swine flu cases, making it second only to New York in numbers with another 40 probable; I suspect that the 100 students is 100 students out of school rather than 100 students confirmed with the flu, but given the new not-testing-everybody policy there's not going to be a way to differentiate. Apparently there's also some confusion as reports go to the county first, and stuff comes in to the state at different rates.
I'm beginning to think it might not be such a bad thing to get it now, which would probably give you some immunity if it comes back as a worse version in the winter.
@Blinky987: Oh, let's not forget the potential for auto-immune problems, where healthy people can die from their robust immune system's reaction to the flu, not the flu itself.
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The media really needs to just cool it with the Swine flu panic reports. Emergency rooms and walk-in clinics across the country are getting unnecessarily strained by all this hype and it's hurting their ability to treat people who truly need help.
2005 Avian Flu: 257 deaths to date worldwide
Sars 2002-03 : 774 deaths
Average garden variety flu- 30,000 American citizens with 5% of the population per year.
Brett Stephens in todays WSJ-
In other words, despite all the processes of globalization that are said to be leading us toward nature's great comeuppance, trend lines indicate we are better equipped than ever to minimize the effects of a pandemic.Why? Because wealthier people tend to be healthier people, and because wealthier societies have more to invest in medicine and research, and because a higher standard of living tends to correlate with more personal space. Also, because globalization means information sharing across boundaries, and rapid adoption of best practices, and greater transparency.
It's also important to remember that the child who died also had some underlying health problems. Today's Washington Post has an article examining some of the reasons why Mexicans have suffered the worst deaths. The article suggests that poverty and self-remedies are contributing. So if you suspect you have something, go to the doctor to make sure it's not just the regular flu, which you can fight with antibiotics, or just a lot of NyQuil.
@pecan 3.14159265: the boy that died was from one of the whealthiest families in Mexico. His family owns one of the biggest private hospital \"chains\" here.
No, no no. Viruses don't respond to antibiotics. Overuse of antibiotics to ineffectively treat viral infections such as the flu is why we have antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains!
Superbugs. Are. Not. Nice.
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@pecan 3.14159265: Flu's a virus. You can't fight it with antibiotics. All that will do is help boost resistance to the antibiotic you're prescribed. Bed rest, and aspirin or similar for the fever is really all you can do.
@pecan 3.14159265: This. And I have many friends from Mexico, or their parents are from Mexico -- they are much less likely to go to the doctor when they are sick (due to both inadequate access to health care, and the way their culture looks at being sick). Here in America, we're much more likely to go \"FLU!\" and run to the doc, but there, they aren't.
@Chris Swingler: @RecordStoreToughGuy: @pezstar: Geez, geez, people, one damn mistake on a thing I don't know much about. Pardon me for not looking it up on Web MD. Man.
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@pecan 3.14159265: The sad part is this is supposed to be basic h.s. biology. There's no need to look it up on WebMD.
Then people wonder why things like MRSA exist. :-p
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That's 1 down, 36,000 more before H1N1 overtakes regular influenza in yearly US deaths.
I, for one, welcome our swine flu overlords.
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I was cleaning out the fireplace last night and inhaled a lot of dust. Coughed all the way to the doctor and found out it was just chimney flue.
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I'm getting tired of the swine flu. I think it needs a snappier name like the mexican pork flu.
@MaytagRepairman: According to http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Swine_Flu it is also know as \"pig AIDS\" or the \"enchiladapocalypse.\"
pork flu is perfect...
overinflated hype over nothing flu.
continue with the propaganda government/media.
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What does this have to do with consumerists? Is www.consumeristhealth.com coming soon????
I'm from McAllen, and I was just waiting for the border towns to get hit with a death. It's awful that this is happening.
Stay safe everyone.
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They're already swapping up our finals schedule at my community college \"just in case\" we have to shut down.
I'm afraid that even though we're in North Texas, this will be the final straw.
Thanks for the five less days to study, paranoid administrators!
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My parents believe this is a coverup because money and tourism are important. In China during the SARS outbreak they had ambulances transport dead bodies out of the province so that people weren't aware of the deaths. This Swine Flu is attacking healthy people, that's the problem. If the public doesn't take things like this seriously then they will get out of hand like the 1918 Spanish Flu.
Unrelated to the flu... why must rednecky pics of someone in an ugly hat or ugly boots or ugly spurs etc etc etc always have to be associated with Texas?? Ugh.
this is incorrect. the 1st US victim was a child in houston - the grandson of a mexican media mogul. get your facts straight, consumerist!!!
300+ MILLION people in the USA alone. And ONE person dies from it.
Stop the fear mongering.
This article is like saying \"Man with cold dies (but he was also on fire)\".
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They recently closed an elementary school in my town for a week because of a \"highly likely\" case of H1N1 in one of the kids. Gotta love how much these people freak out over swine flu when normal flu kills so many people every year. Heck, might as well start shutting everything down every flu season, just to make sure ;-)
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I ate Mexican yesterday for Cinco De Mayo and drank a bunch of margaritas. When I went back to work I pretended to have swine flu by coughing on everyone. They sent me home for being drunk but not for having swine flu. At least I got to go home...
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Is it time to panic yet?
@pecan 3.14159265: Only if you suffer from \"other, chronic, health problems.\"
@pecan 3.14159265: You mean you're not panicking already?
@pecan 3.14159265: Nope. She likely would've died from the regular flu, too, if she was already in very poor health.