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Contents contributed and discussions participated by Casey Finnerty

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Casey Finnerty

Flu shot time? Google Flu Trends predicts worst season on record. - Slate Magazine - 0 views

www.slate.com/...t_season_on_record.single.html

virology microbiology influenza

shared by Casey Finnerty on 15 Jan 13 - Cached
  • If you ask the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, this year’s flu season is looking “moderately severe.”
  • if you ask Google Flu Trends, we’re in the midst of an outbreak that is shaping up to be the most extensive on record.
  • CDC still drives the bulk of national media coverage
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • The CDC’s current estimates aren’t all that current.
  • the numbers can tell us only how many people were suffering from the flu a couple weeks ago.
  • scans millions of Google searches from around the world to track flu activity in near real time.
  • CDC outpatient surveillance figure of an unprecedented 8.9 percent.
  • “Is it going to be a more severe season than last year? I think without question,” Jhung said. “Is it going to be a more severe season than a couple years ago, or the previous 10 years? We don’t know, and won’t know until the end of the season.”
  • the dominant strain so far this year is H3N2, not the novel “swine flu” strain of H1N1 that spooked the world.
  • the figure to which Google Flu Trends corresponds is the one that tells us what percentage of outpatient doctor visits are flu-related at the institutions in the CDC’s reporting network. But a separate PLOS One study from 2011 found that it doesn’t correlate quite as well with another CDC metric that’s based on the number of laboratory-confirmed cases of the flu.
Casey Finnerty

Flu Deaths Reach Epidemic Level, but May Be at Peak - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...levels-but-may-be-peaking.html

virology influenza microbiology

shared by Casey Finnerty on 13 Jan 13 - Cached
  • Although the report supported getting flu shots, it said that new vaccines offering lifelong protection against all flu strains, instead of annual partial protection against a mix-and-match set, must be created.
  • “Vaccine effectiveness” is a very different metric from vaccine-virus match, which is done in a lab. Vaccine efficacy is measured by interviewing hundreds of sick or recovering patients who had positive flu tests and asking whether and when they had received shots.
  • During the 2009 swine flu pandemic, many elderly Americans had natural protection, presumably from flus they caught in the 1930s or ’40s.
  • ...12 more annotations...
  • “Think about that,” Dr. Osterholm said. “Even though they were old, they were still protected. We’ve got to figure out how to capture that kind of immunity — which current vaccines do not.”
  • Dr. Bresee acknowledged the difficulties, saying: “If I had the perfect answer as to how to make a better flu vaccine, I’d probably get a Nobel Prize.”
  • a preliminary study rated this year’s vaccine as 62 percent effective, even though it is a good match for the most worrisome virus circulating.
  • urged Americans to keep getting flu shots.
  • Even though deaths stepped — barely — into epidemic territory for the first time last Saturday, the C.D.C. officials expressed no alarm, and said it was possible that new flu infections were peaking in some parts of the country.
  • Epidemiologists count how many death certificates are filed in a flu year, compare the number with normal years, and estimate what percentage were probably flu-related.
  • The C.D.C.’s vaccine effectiveness study bore out the point of view of a report released last year by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. It said that the shot’s effectiveness had been “overpromoted and overhyped,” said Michael T. Osterholm, the center’s director.
  • At the same time, he praised the C.D.C. for measuring vaccine effectiveness in midseason. “We’re the only ones in the world who have data like that,” he said.
  • “To get a vaccine across the ‘Valley of Death’ is likely to cost $1 billion,”
  • the metric means the shot “reduces by 62 percent your chance of getting a flu so bad that you have to go to a doctor or hospital.”
  • “far from perfect, but by far the best tool we have to prevent influenza.”
  • Most vaccinations given in childhood for threats like measles and diphtheria are 90 percent effective or better. But flu viruses mutate so fast that they must be remade annually.
Casey Finnerty

An influenza primer, updated for 2012/13 | Ars Technica - 0 views

arstechnica.com/...enza-primer-updated-for-201213

virology microbiology influenza

shared by Casey Finnerty on 13 Jan 13 - No Cached
Casey Finnerty

Flu shot time? Google Flu Trends predicts worst season on record. - Slate Magazine - 0 views

www.slate.com/...ts_worst_season_on_record.html

virology influenza microbiology

shared by Casey Finnerty on 10 Jan 13 - No Cached
  • The CDC’s current estimates aren’t all that current.
  • That’s where Google comes in.
  • the numbers can tell us only how many people were suffering from the flu a couple weeks ago.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • According to a study published in Nature in February 2009, the system can detect outbreaks nearly two weeks before they show up in the official CDC reports.
  • won’t know until the end of the season.”
Casey Finnerty

Interim Guidance on Environmental Management of Pandemic Influenza Virus | Flu.gov - 0 views

www.flu.gov/...influenzaguidance.html

microbiology influenza virology

shared by Casey Finnerty on 09 Jan 13 - No Cached
  • Influenza A and B viruses can persist on both nonporous and porous environmental surfaces for hours to days depending on a variety of human and environmental factors.
Casey Finnerty

A Breakthrough Against Leukemia Using Altered T-Cells - NYTimes.com - 1 views

www.nytimes.com/...mia-using-altered-t-cells.html

virology cancer immunology microbiology

shared by Casey Finnerty on 10 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • To perform the treatment, doctors remove millions of the patient’s T-cells — a type of white blood cell — and insert new genes that enable the T-cells to kill cancer cells. The technique employs a disabled form of H.I.V. because it is very good at carrying genetic material into T-cells. The new genes program the T-cells to attack B-cells, a normal part of the immune system that turn malignant in leukemia.
  • The T-cells home in on a protein called CD-19 that is found on the surface of most B-cells
  • cytokine-release syndrome, or cytokine storm
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Dr. June knew that a drug could lower IL-6
  • tocilizumab
  • the altered T-cells persist in the bloodstream
  • The researchers are not entirely sure why the treatment works, or why it sometimes fails.
  • It is not clear whether a patient’s body needs the altered T-cells forever. The cells do have a drawback: they destroy healthy B-cells as well as cancerous ones, leaving patients vulnerable to certain types of infections, so Emma and the other patients need regular treatments with immune globulins to prevent illness.
Casey Finnerty

mBio - September/October 2012, 3 (5) - 0 views

mbio.asm.org/5.toc

virology influenza H5N1

shared by Casey Finnerty on 04 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • Casey Finnerty on 04 Dec 12
     
    This issue of mBio has several updates and opinion pieces on the H5N1 research moratorium.
Casey Finnerty

Experimental adaptation of an influenza H5 HA confers respiratory droplet transmission ... - 5 views

www.nature.com/...nature10831.html

virology influenza H5N1

shared by Casey Finnerty on 04 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • Casey Finnerty on 04 Sep 14
     
    This paper by the Kawaoka group is the first report of an H5N1 virus that is transmissible by aerosol between mammals.
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