Pandemic Influenza

(CIDRAP News) – Employees without paid sick days were more likely to work when they were sick during the peak of the fall pandemic wave and may have extended the outbreak by infecting their coworkers, according to a research group.

(CIDRAP News) – With pandemic flu activity continuing to ease except in a few hot spots, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today it will convene its emergency group of experts at the end of the month to discuss a move to the post-peak phase of the pandemic.

(CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) reported today that 225 cases of H1N1 flu with resistance to oseltamivir (Tamiflu) have been found worldwide, and resistant viruses have spread from person to person in several clusters but have not spilled into the community.

(CIDRAP News) – Pandemic flu activity last week stayed level with the previous week, though the virus continues to circulate and cause deaths, prompting a warning from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that Americans shouldn't let their guard down.

(CIDRAP News) – The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) yesterday notified healthcare providers that 50 lots of Sanofi Pasteur's pandemic H1N1 vaccine in prefilled syringes have a shorter shelf life than shown on the label.

(CIDRAP News) – Fine-tuning pandemic communications strategies relating to children's issues can help avoid problems that doctors and hospitals experienced during surges of novel H1N1 flu, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said today in new guidance.

(CIDRAP News) – Officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) and a vaccine-maker trade group at a public hearing today defended themselves against allegations from some European politicians that they exaggerated the H1N1 pandemic threat to benefit drug companies.

(CIDRAP News) – Just days before a Council of Europe hearing to discuss claims that pharmaceutical companies influenced the World Health Organization's (WHO's) pandemic response, the global body said charges by some European officials that the pandemic is "fake" are "wrong and irresponsible."

(CIDRAP News) – College students living in dorms reduced their risk of influenza-like illness (ILI) at the peak of the flu season by wearing surgical masks a few hours a day and practicing good hand hygiene, say researchers from the University of Michigan.

(CIDRAP News) – In one of the first large serologic studies of pandemic H1N1 infection, British researchers found that in areas hit hard during the first wave, one in three children were infected by the virus, ten times higher than surveillance estimates.