Swine Flu

[t00fri]

In Germany, the Swine flu is massively gaining ground. Every Monday Germany's Robert Koch institute publishes the numbers from the past week. Today is Monday. Here we go:



We can observe a rough doubling of H1N1 infections in each week, meaning a strong exponential growth! In only a few weeks the number of H1N1 deaths jumped from zero to 20.



The infection curve as function of time is virtually "exploding" lately...

Here is a color coded Swine flu "atlas" of Germany.


Red is STRONGLY above normal.
It's particularly dramatic in Bavaria, where the Octoberfest causes a huge increase and speading of the virus activity, notably due to our many visitors from the US (who LOVE the Octorberfest)

Fridger

[t00fri]

Number of confirmed deaths among pandemic (H1N1) 2009 influenza cases by week of notification. EU and EFTA countries (week 25 to week 46, 2009)


Source: EUROPEAN CENTRE FOR DISEASE PREVENTION AND CONTROL (ECDC)

The strong rise of H1N1-caused fatalities during the last four weeks in Europe is evident!

Total numbers of deaths are as of today:
Europe: 549
World: 6747 + 549

Fridger

[LordFerret]

I guess it was inevitable, I got sick, but I'm not sure it was H1N1. I had light fever, aches in neck and shoulders with enlarged lymph glans, I could not swallow, and my chest was "gurgling". My throat was the worst, not being able to swallow, not even tea, it hurt so damned much. Whatever it was, some manner of strep throat I suspect, I was given moxifloxacin which seemingly knocked it out of me in 5 days. The only downside is that I had bloodwork done last week and they tell me my liver enzymes aren't what they should be.

I know political discussion is not permitted, but I must say Fridger, despite how attractive it looks that all in your country receive flu shots for free, I for one do not care for socialized medicine nor the 'big govenrment' that comes with it. That statement should as well define my position and opinion of Obama. For a long time now, cities and communities here in the US have all given out free flu shots to anyone who wanted one... for the seasonal flu we've always had anyway. The only reason we're short-stocked on H1N1 is because of the BS bureaucracy of this current administration, the do we or don't we indecisiveness on the funding for it. We could have had this locked down already had we moved earlier on it.

My apologies Seldon.

[Fenerit]

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My apologies Seldon.

Perhaps a Galactic Trilogy typo?

[t00fri]

I guess it was inevitable, I got sick, but I'm not sure it was H1N1. I had light fever, aches in neck and shoulders with enlarged lymph glans, I could not swallow, and my chest was "gurgling". My throat was the worst, not being able to swallow, not even tea, it hurt so damned much. Whatever it was, some manner of strep throat I suspect, I was given moxifloxacin which seemingly knocked it out of me in 5 days. The only downside is that I had bloodwork done last week and they tell me my liver enzymes aren't what they should be.

I know political discussion is not permitted, but I must say Fridger, despite how attractive it looks that all in your country receive flu shots for free, I for one do not care for socialized medicine nor the 'big govenrment' that comes with it. That statement should as well define my position and opinion of Obama. For a long time now, cities and communities here in the US have all given out free flu shots to anyone who wanted one... for the seasonal flu we've always had anyway. The only reason we're short-stocked on H1N1 is because of the BS bureaucracy of this current administration, the do we or don't we indecisiveness on the funding for it. We could have had this locked down already had we moved earlier on it.

My apologies Seldon.

Well, sorry to read that you were ill. From my perspective, it seems unlikely that you had the Swine Flu, because the fever was only mild. I know that exceptions are possible, still lack of fever is a fairly rare Swine flu variant. Moreover, you are presumably also in an age class that seems partly immune. I also had a pretty nasty flu-type infection for almost a week, despite having been vaccinated against Swine flu almost 3 weeks earlier. So full protection could have been assumed. No fever either. Such type of infections are very common at this time of the year, irrespective of the Swine flu.

As to your liver enzymes: an elevated GammaGT (aka GGT) value often points to somewhat excessive alcohol habits But of course there may well be other causes for abnormalities of the liver data.

As to Obama's efforts towards a general health care in the US, the opposition of many US citizens appears hard to understand to most Europeans. I am aware that in the US people want to keep the government out of their private lifes as much as possible, and morover the word "socialilsm" is not very popular in your country (socialism meaning that the strong, young and healthy parts of the population pay in part for the weak, old and sick). All over Europe we mostly feel very comfortable with that kind of philosophy ...

I also was "explained" by Reiko that those reported 30 million people in the US without any health care backup are mostly illegal immigrants and not proper American citizens? Hmm... The number of jobless people in the US has now risen to about 10%. Can these 10% still affort buying private health care policies or pay for hospital or other medical service out of their own "pocket" ?

Of course all this concerns decisions to be made by the American people (and noone else).

Fridger

[LordFerret]

As to your liver enzymes: an elevated GammaGT (aka GGT) value often points to somewhat excessive alcohol habits But of course there may well be other causes for abnormalities of the liver data.

LOL!... my doctor asked me if I 'drank'. I don't however, not even a drop, I cannot, it conflicts with my other medications. I'm going to guess for now the unbalance in liver enzyme(s) could be from the antibiotic I was given, as it is mentioned in the possible side-effects. My next blood test should tell the story there.

I just love it when the side-effects are worse than the illness.

[Guckytos]

Yeah,

you should start thinking if the doctors really know what they are doing when they start prescribing you medications to counter the sice-effects of the medicine you are already using. Especially when the some of the things you already use are for countering other side effects.

Perhpas you should then do one of the following things (depending on how adventurous you are):
1. Talk with your doc about it.
2. Change the doctor and bring all prescriptions with you and tell him to start from scratch
3. Go to a witch doctor for help
4. Just stop taking ANY of the prescriptions and see what happens.

Point 3 and 4 may have slight side effects, like
a) getting you completely healthy (desirable for you, bad for the doctors and pharma industry)
or
b) killing you (very undesirable for you, and also bad for the doctors and pharma industry)

Don't take anything of this seriously, I'm just in a joking mood.

[t00fri]

As to your liver enzymes: an elevated GammaGT (aka GGT) value often points to somewhat excessive alcohol habits But of course there may well be other causes for abnormalities of the liver data.

LOL!... my doctor asked me if I 'drank'. I don't however, not even a drop, I cannot, it conflicts with my other medications. I'm going to guess for now the unbalance in liver enzyme(s) could be from the antibiotic I was given, as it is mentioned in the possible side-effects. My next blood test should tell the story there.

I just love it when the side-effects are worse than the illness.

In most cases, the liver shows a considerable self-healing effect, notably if it was irritated by alcohol or drugs.

Fridger

[ajtribick]

I know political discussion is not permitted, but I must say Fridger, despite how attractive it looks that all in your country receive flu shots for free, I for one do not care for socialized medicine nor the 'big govenrment' that comes with it. That statement should as well define my position and opinion of Obama. For a long time now, cities and communities here in the US have all given out free flu shots to anyone who wanted one... for the seasonal flu we've always had anyway. The only reason we're short-stocked on H1N1 is because of the BS bureaucracy of this current administration, the do we or don't we indecisiveness on the funding for it. We could have had this locked down already had we moved earlier on it.

Interesting this has remained so long ... I seem to recall criticisms of the Republican administration were disappeared quite quickly