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(CIDRAP News) – Just as this year's early seasonal influenza immunization drive is getting under way, some vaccination providers are having trouble getting vaccine doses, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported today.

Sep 9, 2009

(CIDRAP News) – In a follow-up to new influenza guidelines for child care settings, federal experts were on hand today during a Web telecast to answer questions from parents, focusing on child care and concerns about youngsters who have chronic health conditions such as asthma and diabetes.

(CIDRAP News) – Revised recommendations from federal health officials on the use of influenza antiviral drugs suggest that clinicians consider providing prescriptions over the phone for high-risk patients as a way to start treatment faster if they come down with flu symptoms.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today launched the Reportable Food Registry, an electronic portal designed to prevent foodborne illness outbreaks in real-time by speeding the response at the first sign of a positive test for a pathogen or contaminant in food or animal feed.

Sep 8, 2009

Sep 4, 2009

(CIDRAP News) – Federal health officials provided updated guidelines today for responding to novel H1N1 and seasonal influenza in child care settings, recommending that providers conduct daily health checks on all children and staff, among other steps.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) today reported an increase in pandemic H1N1 flu activity in the nation, focused primarily in five southeastern states, along with an isolated case of swine H3N2 influenza in a patient from Kansas.

Officials from the CDC have said they expect flu activity to pick up again when students return to school, and many districts in the southeast resumed classes on Aug 10.

Sep 3, 2009

(CIDRAP News) – Though the pandemic H1N1 virus never faded from the scene during the summer, illnesses are starting to pick up again, particularly in the southeastern states where school has already started, Thomas Frieden, MD, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today.

(CIDRAP News) – The Institute of Medicine (IOM) today affirmed existing federal guidance that healthcare workers caring for H1N1 influenza patients should wear fit-tested N95 respirators, not just surgical masks, to protect them from the virus.

(CIDRAP News) – In advance of the expected pandemic H1N1 vaccination campaign this fall, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) yesterday invited the media to join federal officials in a tabletop exercise to prepare for some possible communications challenges.

(CIDRAP News) – When a novel H1N1 influenza virus meets up with a seasonal flu virus inside an animal, the novel virus is likely to outdo the seasonal strain—and unlikely to mix with it, according to a report published yesterday.

Sep 2, 2009

(CIDRAP News) – Vaccination against the pandemic H1N1 influenza will be required for all uniformed US military personnel, with the immunizations starting in early October, the Department of Defense (DoD) announced yesterday.

In a news release, Army Lt. Col. Wayne Hachey, the department's director of preventive medicine, said vaccination will be mandatory for uniformed personnel and will be available to all military family members who want it.

(CIDRAP News) – President Barack Obama warned today that a larger wave of novel H1N1 influenza is likely this fall and called on all Americans to prepare for it.

"I don't want anybody to be alarmed, but I do want everybody to be prepared," Obama said in a Rose Garden statement after a meeting with several cabinet secretaries to discuss the pandemic.

Sep 1, 2009

(CIDRAP News) – Egyptian authorities have reported two more H5N1 avian influenza cases, both in children, raising the country's total for this year to 34, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported today.

Both patients have been treated with oseltamivir (Tamiflu) and are in stable condition, the WHO said.

Aug 31, 2009