National Influenza Vaccination Week (NIVW) is a national observance that was established to highlight the importance of continuing influenza vaccination, as well as fostering greater use of flu vaccine after the holiday season into January and beyond. This year’s NIVW (originally scheduled for December 6-10, 2009) is now rescheduled for January 10–16, 2010. Every year, certain days of NIVW are designated to highlight the importance for different groups like health care workers and children to [...]
Influenza Quiz: True or False? Flu Viruses Live Longer on Surfaces Than Cold Viruses
Studies have found that the survival time for both kinds of viruses varies greatly, from a few seconds to 48+ hours. The reasons have to do with a number of factors, including the type of surface, humidity and temperature. For example, cold and flu viruses survive longer on inanimate surfaces that are nonporous, like metal, plastic and wood, and less on porous surfaces, like clothing, paper and tissue. Most flu viruses can live one to [...]
H1N1 (Swine Flu): Hand Sanitizers’ – Claims Don’t Always Correspond to Real-World Practices
Nothing like a few diseases to give rise to a whole new class of products proclaiming that “they” will kill 99.9% of common bacteria, viruses and fungi. This includes everything from hand-sanitizing liquids to products like computer keyboard and shopping cart tissues. However, they often are based on laboratory tests that don’t represent the imperfections of real-world use. Human subjects, or countertops, in labs are usually cleaned first, then covered on the surface with a [...]
H1N1 (Swine Flu): Mild Pandemic? It All Depends On How You Define It…Don’t Lull Yourself To Sleep!
Mike Osterholm, CIDRAP Director and author of the subsription series CIDRAP Business Source brought up an important issue in this weeks writing…We should banish the word “mild” from the influenza lexicon. There’s no such thing as a mild case of influenza, any more than there are “mild” auto accidents or “slightly” pregnant. There are cases that for reasons we don’t understand don’t make you very sick, and there are cases that can lay you lower [...]
