Word: spreads
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...this weekend however the media has been very involved in transmitting the latest information from all the public health organizations and specialists in disease tracking. "We are very, very concerned," World Health Organization spokesman Thomas Abraham said. "We have what appears to be a novel virus and it has spread from human to human ... It's all hands on deck at the moment...
...Secondly, there are several theories about why flu viruses do not spread with the rapidity and scale that they once did. One of the probable reasons is is that flu vaccines diminish the spread of the disease in general by cutting down on the spread of specific strains. This even extends to the vaccinations of animals that are the primary carriers of the infectious viruses. In addition, the CDC said that two major flu drugs, Tamiflu and Relenza, appear likely to diminish the severity of symptoms for the new strain, if taken in the first 48-hours of this Swine...
...investors battled their own nerves. Recovering slightly from earlier losses, Britain's FTSE 100 index of leading shares was down just under 1% in early afternoon trading. Indices in France and Germany, likewise up on their earlier lows Monday, were nonetheless subdued amid the global jitters triggered by the spread of the flu virus. Earlier, shares in Hong Kong closed down...
...apparent emergence in several countries of an entirely new strain of H1N1 flu virus has led some scientists to believe that it is only a matter of time before the WHO declares pandemic status, a move that could prompt travel bans to infected countries. "We are clearly seeing wide spread," says Michael Osterholm, a pandemic risk expert who runs the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. "There is no question." (See a photogallery on swine flu hitting Mexico...
...responsibility of declaring when a new flu pandemic is underway, and to simplify the process, the U.N. body has established six pandemic phases. Thanks to H5N1 avian flu, which has killed 257 people since 2003 but doesn't spread very well from one human to another, we're currently at phase 3. If the WHO upgraded that status to phase 4, which is marked by a new virus that begins to pass easily enough from person to person that we can detect community-sized outbreaks, such a move would effectively mean that we've got a pandemic on our hands...