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Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Nov 4

@CDCgov

1. A #flu thread.
@CDCgov's weekly flu update is up. The data are for the week that ended Oct. 29. CDC is having a press conference on flu and other respiratory bugs at noon; I'll likely add to this after that.
First thing: The flu season is indeed off to a very early start.

2. The sharp rise in medical visits for #influenza-like illnesses (ILIs) is unusual this early. 2 caveats:
- This is not all #flu. There's a lot of RSV going around now; it is captured in the graph.
- This tells us there's a lot of flu-like illness. Says nothing about severity.

@CDCgov

3. It's going to take time to see whether this is going to be an early & severe #flu season, or early & moderate or early & mild. (Not betting on the last option.)
To date @CDCgov estimates there have been at least 1.6M flu illness, 13K hospitalizations & 730 deaths from flu.

Read 10 tweets

Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Oct 31

1. #Ebola thread.
The numbers in the Ugandan outbreak are rising pretty rapidly. Last week this outbreak was the 11th largest on record. It's now the 8th. There's a fairly big gap between 8th and 7th, but I would not bet against this outbreak moving further up the top 10 list.

2. One of the reasons I think this #Ebola outbreak could get a lot larger is just the pace of the recent growth of cases & the presence of cases in Kampala. But also, the followup rate of contacts listed in the latest SitRep from Uganda is not great.

3. Uganda has been boasting a contact follow up rate of in the mid-to-high 90% range. It's down to 88%. And that's of the contacts they know if. If they are missing cases, there are more contacts they don't know of.
The bigger an outbreak gets, the harder this job becomes.

Read 4 tweets

Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Oct 28

@CDCgov

1. So #flu season is taking off at quite a clip. A 🧵
A child died from flu in the week ending Oct. 8, @CDCgov reports in this week's FluView. This is the first pediatric flu death in the 2022-2023 reporting period.

2. #Flu hospitalizations have been climbing steadily since the 2022-23 reporting year started at the beginning of Oct.
In the week ending Oct. 22 (week 42), more than 2,300 people were hospitalized for flu. This is higher than any week 42 going back a decade.

@CDCgov

3. @CDCgov estimates that to date this year there have been roughly 888,000 #flu illnesses, 6,900 hospitalizations and 360 flu deaths.
FluView is viewable here: cdc.gov/flu/weekly/

Read 7 tweets

Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Oct 24

1. Short #Ebola thread.
The outbreak in Uganda is getting quite large. Very concerning situation. But there's been some extraordinary good news. Merck, which makes the first licensed Ebola Zaire vaccine, has found it has 100,000 bulk doses of Ebola Sudan vaccine.

@sciencecohen

2. @sciencecohen reported on this amazing situation. Merck relinquished the IP for the #Ebola Sudan vaccine several years ago, but while it still held it the company made bulk vaccine as a hedge against an Ebola Sudan outbreak. It's still viable. science.org/content/articl…

@WHO

3. @WHO is already planning a clinical trial of candidate vaccines which is supposed to start soon. The Merck vaccine, which stands a good chance of being effective, will surely be added to the mix. I wrote about the clinical trial late last month. #Ebola statnews.com/2022/09/29/ebo…

Read 7 tweets

Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Oct 21

@CDCgov

1. A short #flu 🧵
I started this week with a story about the fact that @CDCgov is seeing signs of an early start to the flu season. Some of those signs are apparent in this week's Fluview, which reports on flu activity for the week ending Oct. 15. statnews.com/2022/10/17/cdc…

2. The percentage of #flu tests that were positive for flu were 2.5% three weeks ago, 3.3% two weeks ago & 4.4% last week. Flu hospitalizations are climbing. Transmission is heating up in the SE & southcentral part of the country, but starting up the Eastern seaboard too.

3. The percentage of people going to doctors for respiratory illness is rising. (See the 2022-23 curve in the blue circle.) Pre-Covid, activity above the dotted line was typically thought to be mainly #flu. This graph will be harder to read in an era where flu & Covid coexist.

Read 5 tweets

Helen Branswell 🇺🇦

@HelenBranswell

Oct 19

@WHO

1. Short thread from @WHO's weekly press conference. Covid-19 remains a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), the @WHO emergency committee decided at a meeting last week. Today @drtedros said he agrees.

2. The EC chair, Didier Houssin, said for the first time at this meeting, the committee talked about the possibility of terminating the PHEIC. But the committee concluded it was too early to do so. Among other things, they want to see how this winter goes in the NHemisphere.

@DrTedros

3. @DrTedros revealed that @WHO and partners have decided to effectively ration #Cholera vaccines, because of a global shortage. Normally cholera vax is given in 2 doses but will be used as a 1 dose vaccine. This strategy has been shown to be effective before.

Read 10 tweets

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