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medpundit |
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Saturday, December 20, 2003At least 42 children and teenagers have died of the flu so far this year, fueling concern that this outbreak may be unusually dangerous for young people, federal health officials said Friday. Although it isn't clear if that number is any different than past flu seasons: In a typical year the flu kills about 36,000 Americans. Although there are no national statistics, one estimate calculated that about 92 youngsters younger than 5 succumb in an average year. "So the fact that we have identified a total of 42 children this year of a much broader age distribution . . . is certainly within the estimates of that mathematical model. But it's just too early in the year to really draw any conclusions," Gerberding said. Australia and New Zealand saw similar trends during their flu season in August, which was also predominated by the Fujian strain, just as ours is now. Guess we shouldn't have been surprised. posted by Sydney on 12/20/2003 03:58:00 PM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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