Homer dodging H1N1 severity

• Students lining up for vaccines at school

By Sean Pearson
Homer Tribune

HOMER TRIBUNE/Naomi Klouda - Sixth grader Lance Peterson at West Homer Elementary School gets an H1N1 vaccination shot Tuesday morning. School officials were estimating about 35 percent of the students would get vaccinated in the public schools, which are being given in priority order to protect those most at risk first. More vaccines are on their way through the Alaska Department of Health and Human Services.

HOMER TRIBUNE/Naomi Klouda - Sixth grader Lance Peterson at West Homer Elementary School gets an H1N1 vaccination shot Tuesday morning. School officials were estimating about 35 percent of the students would get vaccinated in the public schools, which are being given in priority order to protect those most at risk first. More vaccines are on their way through the Alaska Department of Health and Human Services.

This week, Homer-area students rolled up their sleeves and bared their arms to brave the much-anticipated H1N1 or “swine flu” vaccine that has many people around the nation standing in long lines to receive.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, 22 million Americans have become sick with H1N1 flu since April. And, even more startling, health officials say about 4,000 have died, including 540 children.
“This is a younger peoples’ flu,” said CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden. “In a normal flu season, 90 percent of the deaths are among people who are over the age of 65. In H1N1, 90 percent of the deaths are in people under the age of 65.”
While the estimates are much higher than previously estimated, officials say it doesn’t mean this strain of the flu has suddenly gotten any worse. Instead, the CDC calls the new figures a long-awaited better attempt to understand the virus’ true toll. They say the vaccine outputs are getting better, but the number of patients and deaths continues to increase.
As the virus takes its toll nationwide, Homer continues to see only sporadic and generally unconfirmed cases of the deadly flu.
“Emergency room visits from H1N1 have increased slightly at South Peninsula Hospital,” said Public Relations Director Derotha Ferraro Tuesday. “Some were sent home, but a few admissions happened mostly due to underlying health conditions.”
According to Ferraro, the slight increase is not greater than the normally expected number of visits during flu season.
In terms of acute care, Ferraro indicated that admissions related to the flu are few.
“There are no higher-than-average admissions due to seasonal flu, it’s just occurring earlier in the season,” she explained. “No patients admitted with flu symptoms have remained longer than a day or two … all have improved and been released.”
Obtaining current information on local H1N1 statistics is difficult, as diagnosing the illness includes a long turnaround time.
“We do rapid tests in house that confirm flu, but it takes an average of three weeks to generate a lab-confirmed H1N1 diagnosis,” Ferraro said. “In all cases so far, the patient has recovered and been discharged before even lab-verifying their illness is H1N1.”
Ferraro also confirmed that there have been no deaths due to flu or pneumonia, and no medevacs have resulted from flu or pneumonia during this flu season from SPH.
Students will continue to receive vaccines into December in Alaska, and the CDC says 25 million doses of the vaccine are now ready for delivery throughout the United States. That’s 10 million more than last week, but demand is still reportedly strong.

Vaccination Schedule

Homer Flex: TBA first week of December
Homer High: TBA first week of December
Homer Middle: TBA first week of December
Kachemak Selo: None requested
Nanwalek: In progress
Port Graham: In progress
Razdolna: None requested
Voznesenka: Nov. 18, 1-2 p.m.
Connections: TBA first week of December

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Posted by Newsroom on Nov 18th, 2009 and filed under Headline News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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