Seasonal Flu Mutation Raises Concerns
Tuesday, 13. January 2009
A couple of years ago, pandemic flu was a hot topic. The media were agog; newspaper articles and TV news segments abounded. Although pandemic flu hasn’t been in the spotlight for a while, every so often, an article will surface that acts as an uncomfortable reminder that pandemic flu hasn’t gone away; it’s just formulating its next move, so to speak (or more properly its next mutation).
Last week, it was the dismaying news that 99 percent of the dominant strain of flu this season is resistant to the antiviral drug Tamiflu. Although the mutation does not seem to have developed as a result of overuse of antivirals (in fact, the mutation seemed to appear first in Norway, where antivirals aren’t even prescribed), the possibility of this resistance transferring to the H5N1 bird flu could be devastating if this strain does, as scientists have predicted, end up mutating and creating the next pandemic. It certainly might give pause to those organizations and universities who have spent money to stockpile Tamiflu as part of their pandemic plan.
Read more about creating a pandemic plan for your university on the Nuesoft Xpress Web site.
