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Tamiflu-resistant swine flu reported in US and Britain
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Four patients at Duke Medical Center in North Carolina tested positive for a strain of swine flu that is resistant to Tamiflu, the antiviral medicine used to stop influenza from spreading inside the body once a person is infected. The Centers for Disease Control is watching closely to see if any mutations in H1N1 appear because this could make it resistant to our current treatments. In Wales, the BBC reported 5 more Tamiflu-resistant swine flu cases this week. Since April more than 50 Tamiflu-resistant cases have been reported, 21 of those in the United States. The CDC claims the U.S. cases are all isolated.
The four patients at Duke University Medical Center were all located on the same floor in a cancer unit. Each was very ill prior to being diagnosed with swine flue, and it is believed they became infected at the hospital. Three of the patients have since died, but it is unclear as to whether the flu was the precise cause of death. The CDC is conducting an investigation, but the hospital says they have no reason to believe there is a hospital-wide risk.
Reports from Norway indicate there may be another more dangerous strain of swine-flu that deeply affects the lungs. This strain has been reported elsewhere in the world, but it has had mixed affects on individuals from very mild to fatal.
Overall, the CDC reports that swine flu cases are decreasing in most states. However the holiday season brings travel and familial exchanges that have a knack for increasing flu diagnoses. [AP]
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