Rhiza Labs FluTracker Forum

Recombinomics commentaries target the scientific community and provide scientific analysis, not head pats. Head pats are put out on a regular basis in agency press releases and media reports.

The commentaries on the UK situation were not exagerations. They identified withheld data on deaths and EXTREME bias in agency reports.

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Data was released in real time and you had access to it.

Yes, Recombinomics is a site where you try to provide latests developtments in the influenza world and yes targets scientific community, but it's very important to give a global perspective and reliable futuribles for more comprhensive work and further collaboration. The truth is our best tool if you like it or not.

1918 is a very confusing debate even between people dedicated to influenza history. Differences are huge and nobody can say I have a definitive number. We know it was severe but not how much it was. Also, serious scintists know that enviromental factors are key to determine severity and morbidity with diseases.

Recombinomics only used public data, which was FAR from real time. The data was withheld and released in a delayed and biased manner.

The 1918 pandemic was severe and the severity was related to the sequence of the recombinant swine virus, which led to 20-100 million deaths of previously healthy young adults. The very young and very old were largely spared, and this distribution was NOT related to environmental factors.

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I read everything I could coming from the UK. The HPA admitted that many who died were not tested and therefore not counted, and that those who had other problems such as a heart attack or pneumonia (their words!) were also often not counted as H1N1 fatalities. They admitted this once or twice early on and then it wasn't admitted again.

So AFAIC any figures coming from official government sources are propaganda.

Yes, this is very usual as there are no enough resources to identify each influenza death, but this doesn't mean every pneumonia or heart attack death is caused by the flu itself, for that we see extrapolations continuously. There are a lot of pathogens out there very more dangerous than influenza that regularly cause more death and illness in the community.

This is not white or black as you paint it.

Your "quotes" should be read very carefully as they may lead to error.





Please.

This is completely unnecessary, absurd and false. Health authorities try to put things into context and seek a balanced response when a crisis hits and usually they don't hide any figure that would cost any life or harm peoples's health. I think you only want to hear how terrible the things might be, but not how they will be in reality. This sort of comments only generate distrust and that's precisely what you fear the most; People don't hearing the advice of health authorities or governments in case of a full pandemic.

Agency reports lead to unnescessary deaths on a daily basis. Many in the UK were not tested or treated due to the downplaying of the infections or focus on at risk groups. Of course this is not limited to the UK. Agencies attempts to not cause "panic" lead to unnecessary deaths daily.

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I partially agree.

Yes, this was a characteristic of the 1918 pandemic and H1N1 (2009). But, we are mainly talking about severity and we know that there were many environmental factors pushing for a severe outcome in those who contracted it. Of course, 222G mutation played a big role in severe and fatal cases. But, you are ignoring that India was the hardest hit by 1918 H1N1 and I think we have much to say about factors here at this point. India didn't even have an established mortality surveillance and the social disruption was also great, there.

You cannot claim that we know the real magnitude of the 1918 pandemic as we have very difference numbers (20M-100M) and this are extrapolated from very limited mortality surveillance systems in 1918, so we could have only 5M-10M or less, other story is morbidity and its effects in social order. I like seeing how you hate to hear 36,000 flu deaths a year and how you love 650,000 flu deaths in the U.S (1918-1919) when this are drawn from the same methods that you distrust. In Spain this goes from 100,000 to 800,000, even some time ago there were people saying 8M people. As you see it's not possible to quantify the real magnitude in numbers.

I would like to stress once more that a 1918-like pandemic is possible but not likely and if this happens we are better prepared than ever. We have stockpiled antivirals and in some cases pre-pandemic vaccines. Influenza surveillance systems around the world are working very closely to detect and to stop novel influenza A viruses.

Real time agency reports are an utopia in economy terms and material resources. Many deaths are not preventable for several factors all we know. And these reports have nothing to do with those deaths you're talking about. In fact, thanks to these reports we have a wider picture of what's circulating and we can treat diseases with major effectiveness.

Please, you are feeding your work of these "agency reports" many times. Sometimes we have to trust a bit more in people (Health officials, Health authorities, The WHO...) who try to prevent catastrophes from happening and give detailed and transparent information to the public when it proceeds.

1918 was catestropihic regardless of the body count of 20 million or 100 million. The problem with the 36,000 annuual flu deaths in the US is that those numbers are compared to lab confirmed deaths, which are a GROSS under estimate. The comparision is apples to oranges.

I don't dispute the fact that in some years there are 36,000 flu deaths in the US.

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Agency reports are carefully released and worded to avoid "panic". They are quite misleading to the general public (and medical personel), leading to unnessary deaths, on a daily basis.

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