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   From: ConsRCons@govt.cda   
      
   Toronto Star  - News / GTA   
      
      
   Two confirmed deaths in Toronto from H1N1flu   
      
   The “swine flu” strain behind the 2009 pandemic is back, but far less   
   deadly: Ontario has recorded 6 deaths; Alberta 5. And that shot you got   
   will protect you.   
      
      
   Unlike 2009, when vaccines against H1N1 were in short supply,   
   authorities anticipated this year's resurgence of the flu strain and   
   included it in the standard shots. More people are likely to have   
   natural immunity to it this time around, after previous exposure.   
      
   The same deadly H1N1 flu virus that caused widespread panic in 2009 is   
   back this year, but experts say there’s a big difference between that   
   outbreak and this flu season.   
      
   Toronto Public Health has confirmed two fatal cases of H1N1, and three   
   other people died elsewhere in Ontario in December. In Alberta, demand   
   for the flu shot spiked after three deaths in Edmonton and two in   
   Calgary from the virus. About 270 others have been hospitalized, and 965   
   cases have been lab-confirmed.   
      
   As of mid-December, there were 52 hospitalizations and 323 reported   
   cases in Ontario.   
      
   The same H1N1 strain caused the 2009 “swine flu” outbreak, which was   
   declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization and killed   
   128 people in Ontario alone between April 2009 and January 2010,   
   according to a Public Health Ontario report.   
      
   The lack of immunity to this strain in children and younger adults made   
   them unusually susceptible to a disease that more typically proves   
   dangerous to elderly people and those with compromised immune systems.   
   Infected pregnant women were hospitalized at a higher-than-average rate,   
   and an infant who died in a London, Ont., hospital was suspected of   
   having the virus.   
      
      
   The real lessons of H1N1   
      
   While health officials and infectious-disease experts say H1N1 is   
   responsible for the majority of flu cases this year on Ontario, those   
   who received a flu shot are probably protected.   
      
   Officially, 130 people died of influenza last year in Toronto, but that   
   figure probably captures only one-quarter of the cases; most go   
   unreported.  About 2,000 people die in Canada year from influenza or its   
   complications.   
      
   Dr. Allison McGeer, infectious disease specialist at Mount Sinai   
   Hospital, said this has been an “average” flu season generally.   
      
   “It’s mostly H1N1, which means it’s mostly in children and younger   
   adults than in older adults and nursing homes,” McGeer said. Mount Sinai   
   hospital has also treated several pregnant women, she said.   
      
   In the last week of December 2012, Toronto Public Health recorded 199   
   lab-confirmed flu cases, mostly seasonal strain H3N2.  This year, the   
   figure stood at just 83, mostly H1N1.   
      
   All new cases diagnosed last week were classified as Influenza A; 15   
   were confirmed as H1N1, and the others are likely also H1N1, McGeer   
   said. There were zero seasonal H3N2 cases, and one case of Influenza B.   
      
   The symptoms of H1N1 are the same as the seasonal flu: fever, aches and   
   pains, chills, sore throat, nausea.  Older adults who may have been   
   exposed to it in the 1950s, when H1N1 also appeared in Canada, have some   
   natural immunity because the strain does not mutate as readily as   
   seasonal flu H3N2 or Influenza B.  The population generally also has   
   more immunity than it did four years ago, when H1N1 made its   
   reappearance here.   
      
   Though this year’s flu vaccine protected against H1N1, its efficacy will   
   be reduced as flu season peaks.  It takes two weeks after the shot to   
   achieve full protection.   
      
   “It’s still better than nothing,” McGeer said.   
      
   There’s no need to panic, said Dr. Doug Sider, medical director,   
   Communicable Disease Prevention and Control at Public Health Ontario.   
      
   Reporting deaths from the flu is “totally expected at this point in time   
   in any given influenza season,” he said, adding that Ontario data is   
   only updated to mid-December and the full impact won’t be known until   
   flu season subsides and full reports are made to public health agencies.   
      
   There are probably “a couple hundred” cases of H1N1 in Ontario so far   
   this season, but at this time last year there were 1,400 confirmed cases   
   of influenza, Sider said, virtually all of them seasonal flu.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)