The WHO Pandemic Alert level remains at Phase 5.
Influenza A (H1N1) Cases and Deaths by Country (as of 8 AM PST May 22st)
*Lab confirmed cases and deaths have been provided by the WHO’s Influenza A (H1N1) – Update #36.
Local/National News
- On May 21th, the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) and the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control (BCCDC) announced that there were no new confirmed cases of influenza A (H1N1) in the country. PHAC also noted that they will only be updating case totals on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
International News
- Dr. Margaret Chan, head of the World Health Organization (WHO), said she would not hesitate to declare a pandemic if the novel H1N1 flu virus starts spreading globally. However, she signaled that she may stray from the WHO's formal definition of a phase 6 pandemic alert by considering the severity of the disease and whether it is spreading in both the northern and southern hemispheres. Pandemic phase 6 is officially defined as community-level spread of a novel virus in more than one global region. Reuters
- Two high school girls who live in the Tokyo area were found to have contracted the novel H1N1 flu yesterday, two days after they returned from a trip to New York City, according to the Japan Times. Their cases are the first in the Tokyo area, the newspaper reported. Japan has over 250 confirmed cases, most of them in the Osaka and Hyogo prefectures, and thousands of schools have been closed. Japan Times
- Mexico City lowered its swine flu alert level from yellow to green on Thursday, and Mayor Marcelo Ebrard said "we can relax" now that there have been no new infections for a week. Ebrard also said the change means the risk of contagion is low, the situation is under control, and the images of countless people wearing blue surgical masks in cars, sidewalks, restaurants and theaters are now behind the city. Associated Press
Vaccine News
- Despite recent news report to the contrary, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has assured health experts and policy makers that efforts to make a vaccine against the the H1N1 virus have not met unexpected delays. Confusion about the vaccine timeline stemmed from a report released this week from the WHO. The group concluded that manufacturers would not be able to begin “large-scale production” of a vaccine against the virus until mid-July. While the report did not describe this issue as a delay, but many media accounts did. Science Insider
Today’s Key Question
How has the outbreak of influenza A (H1N1) progressed in Mexico?
Mexico’s Ministry of Health regularly posts informative, detailed graphs of the country’s outbreak that have received little prime-time exposure. This graph taken from a May 21st report provides a great overview of the evaluation of the outbreak. It is interesting to note that there are 34 cases prior to “patient zero” from La Gloria, Veracruz.
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