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LittleLightShining
10-30-2009, 01:44 AM
Take special notice of the pains they take not to give any demographic information here:

State has first swine flu death
800 doses of swine flu vaccine were destroyed (http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091029/NEWS01/910290373/1002/NEWS01)


BURLINGTON – Vermont has experienced its first death linked to the H1N1 virus, commonly known as swine flu, state health officials said Wednesday.

Health Commissioner Wendy Davis declined to identify the victim other than to say the person was an adult with "a serious medical condition" in addition to the influenza. She would not say where the victim lived, identify the region of the state, or disclose the exact date of the death.

The commissioner said she was being careful in releasing only relevant information to the public out of respect for the victim's family. Davis said she would continue that policy in future cases, as well.

While Davis acknowledged that news of a Vermont death might be unsettling to the public, she cautioned that it was not unexpected and did not signal a change in the severity of the virus. In fact, she reminded reporters at a Burlington news conference, she has been warning from the beginning that the number of cases would climb and the state would in all likelihood experience deaths as a result of the disease.

"It is not a mark that the virus is changing at this point in time," Davis said.

About 36,000 Americans die from seasonal flu annually, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control. To date, more than 1,000 people have died of complications from swine flu and about 20,000 have been hospitalized, the CDC is reporting.

"It's not at all unexpected," Davis

Davis said of Vermont's death. And while expressing sympathy for the family, she added, "It is something we knew we would experience. I anticipate there will be more."

She pointed out that the victim was in a high-risk group, specifically adults with other medical conditions. Other high-risk groups include young children, young adults and pregnant women.

David said that in the past week there has been a "dramatic" increase in the number of swine flu cases reported around the state, as well as visits to hospitals by people experiencing influenza-like symptoms. Schools across Vermont are reporting high absenteeism – one, Burr and Burton Academy in Manchester, closed — and college campuses are seeing an increase in suspected cases, she said.

Davis said her office was notified earlier this week by telephone from a health care provider about the death, which occurred sometime in the past week.

She said most cases, however, have been relatively mild, with people recovering well after staying home and taking care of themselves as they would with any seasonal flu.

"Most people will not need to see the health care provider," Davis said.

The commissioner, who has been speaking regularly about the need for vaccine in Vermont and the urgency of vaccination clinics for at-risk Vermonters, said Wednesday that about 800 doses of the vaccine were inadvertently destroyed over the weekend when a refrigeration unit at a district office malfunctioned and the temperature dropped too low.

"It is treasured," she said of the vaccine. "This loss was extremely concerning to all of us at the Health Department."

Davis said the department is taking measures to prevent a recurrence of such an incident.

"We need to look at every aspect of that storage chain," Davis said. She said the department will prepare to transport vaccine between regions if future problems develop, and might implement a "rigorous, off-hours monitoring" system for the refrigerators.

She said those 800 doses would have provided enough vaccine for about two or three "good sized" school clinics.

Unfortunately, the vaccine has been coming into Vermont so slowly that some school clinics, including one planned for U-32 Middle and High School in East Montpelier on Friday, have been postponed. The clinic schedule will be maintained as planned in future weeks, with the postponed clinics fitted into available time slots in the order they were initially planned.

Davis said 15 clinics were held in schools by the end of the day Wednesday, and 27 are expected by the end of the week. More than 10,500 doses had been administered as of Saturday, said Patsy Kelso, state epidemiologist. More than 38,100 doses have been received and distributed, Davis added.

"We know how hard it is to wait for vaccine, and we are getting it out as soon as possible," Davis said.

Charlie41
10-30-2009, 07:43 AM
You know I just don't get this hole swine flue crap.

Out of 6 billion people in the world, one thousand people have died. And this is a reason for a national emergency? Considering that 20 to 30 thousand die each year from the regular flue.

The drug makers no longer put the inserts in the package, listing the content's of this vaccine. And the only place I could find the list was an online patent.

The drug makers have had since early spring to make plenty of this stuff, and there is a shortage?

The feds have lifted the "no mercury policy" for this season for some reason.

The obama signed an executive order that will not allow you to sue the vaccine makers if you are ill affected by this injection.

And supposedly the obama has a lot of stock in some of these drug makers.

So whats the deal? Is this a scare to boost income for the makers and their investors? Or is the agenda 21 crowd right?

Bruno
10-30-2009, 07:50 AM
I must have missed the part where they tested this person to make sure it was H1N1 flu that the person who died had.

"The commissioner said she was being careful in releasing only relevant information to the public out of respect for the victim's family"

Unfortuntately, Commisioner, you left out all the relevant information!

LittleLightShining
10-30-2009, 07:54 AM
I must have missed the part where they tested this person to make sure it was H1N1 flu that the person who died had.

"The commissioner said she was being careful in releasing only relevant information to the public out of respect for the victim's family"

Unfortuntately, Commisioner, you left out all the relevant information!

I know! I may have to give the health commissioner a call to find out.

Charlie41
10-30-2009, 07:55 AM
To add another thing.

My step daughter is a nurse. She said that the doctors have stopped testing for H1N1. The just call it H1N1 if you have flue like symptoms.

Gee, I wounder how this will affect the #'s?

LittleLightShining
10-30-2009, 09:06 AM
To add another thing.

My step daughter is a nurse. She said that the doctors have stopped testing for H1N1. The just call it H1N1 if you have flue like symptoms.

Gee, I wounder how this will affect the #'s?

Well, I just called the Dept of Health. They referred me to http://www.vermont211.org/ without letting me ask any questions. And of course, I call 211 and the lady has no information.

I've posted a lot of this in other threads, but for context I'll re-explain what I said in the conversation.

Last week my very good friend became sick. She had a cough, was vomiting, had diarrhea, was achy and feverish. After 2 days she became dehydrated and went to the ER. They gave her 2 IV bags and told her she had h1n1. They did not test her. Her children fell ill with the same symptoms. Because she was told she had h1n1 she brought her kids to the doctor. She was told her kids likely had h1n1. They did not test the kids either. (In the meantime my family experienced the same symptoms to varying degrees. I came out of it relatively unscathed.) Today she is still sick but her kids are better.

So the other day I
(here (originally posted here)

listened to a live interactive webcast about h1n1 in VT. I asked via the chat why people are being told at the hospitals and doctors' offices that they have h1n1 when no tests have been administered. They said they are treating all flu-like illnesses as h1n1 right now. Then they went on to say that they are not testing people because the tests are in extremely short supply so they can't test everyone. THEN they went on to say that the vaccines are also in short supply because of the archaic way they must be produced. So the conversation progresses and they are telling people that if they have had the h1n1 they do not need to be vaccinated. But if they have been sick and not tested they should be vaccinated just in case. THINK ABOUT THIS!

The conversation went on and on and on with such disingenuous assertions I wanted to scream. They are freaking everyone out by saying that 1000 people have dies from swine flu already this year and they don't normally see flu this time of year. Ok, so if they are not testing and they admitted that many of the tests they have administered have come back negative for ANY flu HOW can they say these people have actually died from the swine flu.

Then someone asked a question about safety and the Dr from Fletcher Allen hospital, Christopher Grace, went on about how they wouldn't have enough vaccine if the pharma companies were to be held accountable because they would not be assured they would make a profit.

I related all of that to her (she told me we had the flu, btw) and went on to explain that I was very concerned about the lack of information in the article as to whether or not testing was done on this person who died. She could not find information anywhere. We had a good conversation and she was very sympathetic to my line of questioning. I could hear the lightbulb go on and the gears turning over the phone.

She and I both came to the conclusion that I would not find out the whole story as to the testing issue in general or whether or not the adult who died had actually been tested and confirmed for h1n1. So I decided to call Sue Allen, the reporter who wrote the story in the OP.

Sue said that she had received confirmation that the adult was in fact tested and confirmed for h1n1 but she took it for granted that the readers would understand this. I explained that perhaps 99% of the readers would, but I had just participated in the Burlington Free Press' interactive webcast and relayed to her the information about testing that Dr Grace had shared.

She said the the Dept of Health has been testing around 120 people per week and the last weekly figures showed that out of 112 tests administered 48 tested positive for influenza. Of the 48, 45 tested positive for h1n1. The remaining 3 had seasonal flu.

Bruno
10-30-2009, 09:12 AM
Well, I just called the Dept of Health. They referred me to http://www.vermont211.org/ without letting me ask any questions. And of course, I call 211 and the lady has no information.

I've posted a lot of this in other threads, but for context I'll re-explain what I said in the conversation.

Last week my very good friend became sick. She had a cough, was vomiting, had diarrhea, was achy and feverish. After 2 days she became dehydrated and went to the ER. They gave her 2 IV bags and told her she had h1n1. They did not test her. Her children fell ill with the same symptoms. Because she was told she had h1n1 she brought her kids to the doctor. She was told her kids likely had h1n1. They did not test the kids either. (In the meantime my family experienced the same symptoms to varying degrees. I came out of it relatively unscathed.) Today she is still sick but her kids are better.

So the other day I

I related all of that to her (she told me we had the flu, btw) and went on to explain that I was very concerned about the lack of information in the article as to whether or not testing was done on this person who died. She could not find information anywhere. We had a good conversation and she was very sympathetic to my line of questioning. I could hear the lightbulb go on and the gears turning over the phone.

She and I both came to the conclusion that I would not find out the whole story as to the testing issue in general or whether or not the adult who died had actually been tested and confirmed for h1n1. So I decided to call Sue Allen, the reporter who wrote the story in the OP.

Sue said that she had received confirmation that the adult was in fact tested and confirmed for h1n1 but she took it for granted that the readers would understand this. I explained that perhaps 99% of the readers would, but I had just participated in the Burlington Free Press' interactive webcast and relayed to her the information about testing that Dr Grace had shared.

She said the the Dept of Health has been testing around 120 people per week and the last weekly figures showed that out of 112 tests administered 48 tested positive for influenza. Of the 48, 45 tested positive for h1n1. The remaining 3 had seasonal flu.


Thank you very much for that update, LLS! I had basically the same experience online with a local TV stations H1N1 chatroom.

In bold was a fail on the reporters part, imo

LittleLightShining
10-30-2009, 09:16 AM
Oh, and apparently, according to Sue anyway, the information that Dr Grace gave out was extremely contradictory to anything the Health Dept has released.

Oyate
10-30-2009, 09:20 AM
Since I like Vermonters (lived in NEK for about 3 years and it ROCKED) I am volunteering my place to quarantine them. Any Vermonters wanna come over and get quarantined just grab some groceries and some hooch and we'll make a fine convalescence for you in Arizona. You know that place that's warm in the winter? You'll love it.

Don't worry about money, I think I'm gonna get a grant from DHS or become a government contractor or something. We'll all be rich. This could be the thing we've been waiting for.

LittleLightShining
10-30-2009, 09:27 AM
Since I like Vermonters (lived in NEK for about 3 years and it ROCKED) I am volunteering my place to quarantine them. Any Vermonters wanna come over and get quarantined just grab some groceries and some hooch and we'll make a fine convalescence for you in Arizona. You know that place that's warm in the winter? You'll love it.

Don't worry about money, I think I'm gonna get a grant from DHS or become a government contractor or something. We'll all be rich. This could be the thing we've been waiting for.

Arizona sure sounds good to me, Oyate :)

The NEK is awesome. I lived in a little off the grid cabin on the side of a mountain on a class 4 road for 7 years before I moved to town. There's nowhere else like it.