Influenza A (H1N1) Blog

Archive for the ‘fighting influenza’ Category

1. December 15, 2010

   The H1N1 pandemic is over. What does it mean?

   WHO Pandemic Warning Phases.Source [pdf].

   What is a pandemic?

   The World Health Organization (WHO) Emergency Committee declared on August 10 that we left the pandemic phase of the H1N1 virus. “The world is no longer in phase 6 of influenza pandemic alert. We are now moving into the post-pandemic period. The new H1N1 virus has largely run [...]

2. June 13, 2010

   A universal flu vaccine

   Will we have a universal Influenza vaccine someday? Will we find something that eliminates the need of developing a new vaccine every year and ensuring that great part of the population receives it?

   The annual development of flu vaccines is a very expensive way of avoiding this disease even if it is the most efficient way. [...]

3. January 22, 2010

   Mutations and the escape from immunity

   If measles is caused by a virus and it can only be caught once in a life time, why do we catch the flu every year?

   When we have the flu, in a few days the body seems to get rid of the virus. The symptoms rarely last for two weeks and, in a higher period; [...]

4. October 21, 2009

   Antiviral and resistance: sialidase inhibitors

   From adamantine therapeutics failures, interest in developing new drugs against the flu virus had come up. Hence, appeared oseltamivir and zanamivir, neuraminidase inhibitors, the first class of planned drugs against Influenza. Here, the path taken for their production was reverse of that of amantadine. Instead of testing the drug and finding out later how [...]

5. October 10, 2009

   Vaccine against Influenza: Production

   We are in full production phase of vaccines against the Influenza A (H1N1), and some doses are already being distributed in the United States. However, if the virus was already circulating in May, why did it take so long to have the vaccine available? Understand why in this series of posts, beginning with the production [...]

6. October 7, 2009

   Find out more about Influenza by playing games

   There is a series of well conceived online games that help to expose and to understand concepts about the flu and other diseases. Find out what some of them have to add on
   The Great Flu

   With several resources that include instructive videos and relevant and realistic information about the Influenza, the [...]

7. October 1, 2009

   The effectiveness of school closings during an epidemic

   Children have a very important role transmitting the Influenza virus. Since they had less contact with the virus, their immune reaction is lower and less effective; therefore, during the infection they have a higher viral load. A higher viral load associated with contact with several other children from different places in the same school, playing [...]

8. September 28, 2009

   Influenza Air Transmission

   Although it is one of the most basic issues, Influenza virus transmission is still the target of much discussion. The role of contact contamination or through droplets and aerosols is considered a hot potato [1]. After a certain period without many experiments, nowadays we are aware that ferrets and guinea pigs may be infected by [...]

9. August 27, 2009

   Why do we fear Influenza 1 – the antivirals

   First of all, to start this blog, and discuss the H1N1 and the flu in general, I decided to start with texts considering the other side of the Influenza. Let’s see what is going on with the virus and the decisions taken towards the virus.

   With viruses such as Ebola, which killed even 90% of the [...]