The National Immunization Survey-Flu (NIS-Flu) is an ongoing, national telephone survey of households with children in the United States used to measure influenza vaccination coverage. The data collected by NIS-Flu have similarities to data typically analyzed using survival analytic procedures. Estimates of vaccination coverage from the NIS-Flu survey are calculated using Kaplan-Meier survival ...

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) predicted a resurgence of Swine-origin Influenza A (novel 2009 H1N1) pneumonia, hospitalizations and deaths during the 2009-2010 flu season. Immunocompromised patients are at higher risk to contract it and may present (atypically) with greater morbidity and mortality. We report the first radiographic description of CDC-confirmed swine-origin influenza A (no...

The monitoring of seasonal influenza yearly epidemics remains one of the main activity of national syndromic surveillance systems. The development of internet-based surveillance tools has brought an innovative approach to seasonal influenza surveillance by directly involving self-selected volunteers among the general population reporting their health status on a weekly basis throughout the flu ...

Methods Community-recruited adults aged ≥ 50 years were randomized to one of three conditions: 8-week training in mindfulness meditation; matched 8-week training in moderate intensity sustained exercise; or wait-list observational control. The primary outcome was area-under-the-curve global illness severity over one cold and flu season, using the Wisconsin Upper Respiratory Symptom Survey (WURS...

Introduction Public health policies combatting the spread of infectious disease rely on bio-surveillance systems for coordinating responses such as vaccination programs. Classical epidemiology assumes that population behavior remains constant during an epidemic. However, the public response to an epidemic can have a serious impact on an epidemic’s course. As a result, modeling the influence of ...

BACKGROUND Since May 2009, exposure of the population of Beijing, China to pH1N1 has resulted in an increase in respiratory illnesses. Limited information is available on the etiology and clinical characteristics of the influenza-like illness (ILI) that ensued in adults following the pH1N1 pandemic. METHODS Clinical and epidemiological data of ILI in adults was collected. A total of 279 throa...

Early each calendar year, experts assemble to reformulate the trivalent vaccine that protects people against influenza viruses anticipated to circulate in the northern hemisphere during the next season, designating appropriate antigens based on what seems to be circulating locally and in the opposite hemisphere. This past February, members of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory comm...

The emergence of new mutant strains of influenza virus like H1N1, H3N2, H1N9, H7N9, etc. in every season of flu is mainly due to frequent mutation in eight genes of flu virus. This cause influenza virus spreads worldwide and become pandemic in 2009. Every year 36000 peoples are infected from flu. Around 123397 people have been tested itself in India in 2010. Drug for influenza treatment now has...

Transmission of infectious gastroenteritis was studied in 936 predominately Hispanic households in northern California. Among 3,916 contacts of 1,099 primary case-patients, the secondary attack rate was 8.8% (95% confidence interval 7.9-9.7); children had a 2- to 8-fold greater risk than adults. Bed-sharing among children in crowded homes is a potentially modifiable risk.

Noroviruses are endemic in the human population, and are recognised as a leading cause of acute gastroenteritis worldwide. Although they are a highly diverse group of viruses, genogroup-II genotype-4 (GII-4) noroviruses are the most frequently identified strains worldwide. The predominance of GII-4 norovirus strains is driven by the periodic emergence of antigenic variants capable of evading he...