Source: SeniorArk
Newsweek has a feature where you can compete for the best six-word tweet on the cover story. The winners for the swine flu cover story: “Over estimated, over reported, over it” and “Blah, blah, swine flu, blah, blah.”
The public health establishments, such as the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization, have disseminated a great deal of information on what they want the public to know and how they want us to behave. But what goes on backstage, behind the public front? For example, what are doctors being advised, and what are they saying to each other about the current flu epidemic? They’re on the front lines. Are they worried or optimistic?
The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) has created a website called The H1N1 Influenza Center. The site features articles on influenza from back issues of the NEJM, including articles from the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic and even the European flu epidemic of 1837. Normally this information would be available only to subscribers, but everything on the site is free.
There’s some technical, behind-the-scenes information in the articles, such as advice to doctors on how to treat the flu in AIDS patients and pregnant women. But the most interesting information comes from comments written in response to the articles. Doctors from all over the world — Bangladesh, the Philippines, Columbia, Mexico, Singapore, Portugal — express their gratitude for the information provided by this site. Reading their comments, you sense an international community of health care professionals communicating vital information to each other and finding grounds for optimism in the very act of communicating. Here are two samples.
Thank you for great site. The index case [patient zero] of the Singapore General Hospital SARS [bird flu] outbreak in 2003 was at the Dept of Surgery where I still work. The speed of dissemination of information and the level of preparedness has significantly improved between these two outbreaks. At the beginning of the SARS outbreak we functioned on very little scientific information and could only depend on basic principles and discipline to pull us through. In many ways, the international community is more prepared for pandemics than at any other time in history although much more can still be done. Your site is an important contribution to this effort.
I do thank you the opportunity of reading the papers of our old colleagues, also concerned about flu a long time ago. It brings us the same concerns we are living now, and the advice to pay attention to the signs of pandemic with very great precaution.
This is the XXI century and we now have the information and medications to fight this war they didn´t dream about in those years. We have the internet and the value of sharing experiences all over the world, as a huge team of doctors working together in the same challenge. And that is a really nice feeling, isn´t it?
The Lancet in the UK has a similar site. It’s called The H1N1 Flu Resource Center. There’s not as much opportunity here for a behind-the-scenes look. You can write to The Lancet and give them your feedback, but comments are not published. The resources are much more extensive, however. The publisher of The Lancet, Elsevier, is the world’s largest publisher of medical and scientific literature. The site includes flu-related articles from forty journals, including those that specialize in infectious diseases, disaster management, and the immune systems of animals. Like the NEJM site, this is information that’s normally available only by subscription, but in support of the worthy cause of fending off a pandemic, it’s all offered for free. Like the NEJM’s offerings, this is generosity that I’m sure is greatly appreciated by the international medical community.
In a global economy, infectious disease cannot be confined geographically and can spread rapidly. It’s only fitting that we use an information sharing system that is equally global and immediate.
Related posts:
Swine flu and hand washing: The how, the when, and the why
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Flu season: Should we stop shaking hands?
Preparing for the flu: Why don’t we do it in our sleeves?
Fear of flying: Will I catch swine flu on an airplane?
Swine flu parties for kids? Just say no
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