The Whine thread.

[Alelou]

Good for you!

[Bether6074]

I don't think it's calmed down. In fact I think it's about to hit full force when school starts up again. There was an article in the USA Today that said as many as 50% of people might come down with the infection. I'm not sure if that estimate was just for the United States, though. I only saw the headline. As for Eric, it isn't Swine Flu. He has pneumonia. Time to play nursemaid, I guess. And work a lot...

[Distracted]

Novel H1N1 "Swine" flu is definitely not winding down. It's spreading like wildfire in the schools. In my part of the country seasonal flu usually doesn't show up until the end of September at the earliest, but a week before classes even started at the university where I work the administration had to cancel sorority rush activities because of type A flu. Unfortunately, any type A positive flu test this time of year is "Swine" flu until proven otherwise. At work today we ran out of flu tests and had to order an emergency shipment. We'd used the same number of tests by the end of the first week of school that we used by November last year, and we're only testing known symptomatic contacts and people who show up to the clinic with fever. I feel like I should be wearing a mask. Instead, every patient with a fever gets one. Makes for an interesting day when you get back the office after lunch to find a dozen kids in surgical masks lined up sitting in folding chairs in the hallway to separate them from the maybe half-dozen kids in the waiting room without fever. One of the nurses joked that we ought to start bringing the ones without fever into the hall instead so we'd have more room for the ones with fever. Joy.

[Alelou]

I just spent hours in orientation at the college tonight and I'm kind of surprised they didn't even mention this issue.

Oh well.

[Distracted]

Maybe it's not a problem where you are, but if I were you I'd contact your university's student health center and ask them if you need to be concerned. All we've been telling people is to wash their hands before eating, stay at least 3 feet away from anyone who looks sick, don't eat, drink or smoke after people and STAY HOME (and insist that their friends stay home) if they have a fever until 24 hours after the fever goes away. If you're diabetic, asthmatic, immune suppressed, pregnant, elderly or very young then you're a candidate for Tamiflu IF you can get someone to prescribe it in the first 48 hours of symptoms AND you've got the 100+$ to pay for it. Otherwise, I've been recommending Theraflu or something similar. C'est tout. It's just a pain to miss all that work and/or class.

[Alelou]

I'm more worried about my son since he is asthmatic. I guess it might be good to call the pediatrician's office and see what the drill is going to be.

[Aikiweezie]

We've had some kind of short duration (2-3 day) flu going around here in the SW suburbs of Chicago since late June. We've all had it and many of my friends and their children, but none of our doctors tested any of us to see if it a type A or not, and no one, even my friends who are health professionals (er nurses an docs) can tell me if this is H1N1. I hope it is, because that would mean we're done with it, but who knows. I guess we'll go for the shots regardless.

[WarpGirl]

I'm just glad it's not near me, although I feel awful for saying it. My mom would be unbareable if it was, because so many things are screwed up with me she'd go nuts. Really I'm not scared of getting sick, but my mom well... I don't need her stressing out, because she does that enough.

[Dusalis Drake]

Everyday I hear something about H1N1 at LSU. The professors are really pushing to stay home if you're sick and get notes from somebody instead. It's understandable knowing how fast viruses can spread at schools like that. There have been a few cases here. I'm not sure if they were confirmed or not, though, but I believe they were said to be type A. I hardly ever get sick (knock on wood), and I hope it stays that way this semester (and for my study group ).

[JadziaKathryn]

I reckon the university will be warning us, but it hasn't been too bad up here. Which is good. Even if they come out with a vaccine I don't want it. No new vaccines going in me, thankyouverymuch. It's crazy though, to hear how bad it is for Distracted's patients.

[Distracted]

Why no vaccine? It's made out of a piece of the protein coat around the virus. There's no active virus in it so it can't give you flu. Flu virus puts you out of commission for a week, best case scenario. So you miss a week of your life stuck in your house under isolation. Worst case scenario is you get complications and you die. Why would you not take the vaccine?

[Alelou]

No kidding. I'll take any vaccine that's going.

[Bether6074]

I've heard that there will be a vaccine sometime in mid-October, but that it would be given to the most needy and at risk first. Josh is also asthmatic, though 99% of the time you'd never know it. I know of two people who've had it so it is local here. One of them works in the Sand Lake Cumberland Farms and the other is the grandson of a co-worker. It doesn't seem to be highly lethal, but they've said it could mutate and become very deadly. It's scary, but what can you do? Wash your hands a lot and keep your hands away from your eyes, nose and mouth, I guess. I'll be in line with my family for the vaccine as soon as it becomes available to us.

[WarpGirl]

Why no vaccine? It's made out of a piece of the protein coat around the virus. There's no active virus in it so it can't give you flu. Flu virus puts you out of commission for a week, best case scenario. So you miss a week of your life stuck in your house under isolation. Worst case scenario is you get complications and you die. Why would you not take the vaccine?

Well it's not like I can get out of getting vaccinated if they do get one, Mama and Dr. are very grouchy about those things and VERY persuasive... Like make your life miserable with guilt persuasive, but I can tell you I get nervous about allergic reactions. I'm allergic to A LOT! In my medical file there are five pages of the things you cannot give patient # whatever. I'm even allergic to Benadryl. I'm not talking mild reaction I'm talking scare the nurses allergic. So yeah I'm scared. Of course I will have to get it anyway... But yeah scared.

[Distracted]

Well, now it may be too late for the vaccine for me. My eleven year old started with cold symptoms last Thursday and felt so bad Friday that I let her stay home from school. When I started with a sore throat on Friday too, I figured it was probably just her cold. Neither of us were running fever so I took some Advil and went to work Friday. Now she's running 102 temp and I feel worse despite 12 hours of sleep last night. I still don't have fever but I have a sinking suspicion that I'm going to very soon. Wonderful. And she got it first so we didn't even get it from my work. This came from her school. My boss is gonna kill me.

Ah, well. That's what sick leave is for, one of the perks of working a government job and not being in private practice anymore. I thought I'd stop getting my kids' bugs once they got older. I guess I can't assume that I won't as long as my youngest still insists on sleeping with Mommy when she feels bad.