Flu Shots Working, Outbreak Could Be Waning, CDC Says

The flu season appears to be waning in some parts of the country, but that doesn't mean it won't make a comeback in the next few weeks, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Five fewer states reported high flu activity levels in the first week of January than the 29 that reported high activity levels in the last week of December, according to the CDC's weekly flu report. This week, 24 states reported high illness levels, 16 reported moderate levels, five reported low levels and one reported minimal levels, suggesting that the flu season peaked in the last week of December.

"It may be decreasing in some areas, but that's hard to predict," CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden said in a Friday morning teleconference. "Trends only in the next week or two will show whether we have in fact crossed the peak."

The flu season usually peaks in February or March, not December, said Dr. Jon Abramson, who specializes in pediatric infectious diseases at Wake Forest Baptist Health in North Carolina. He said the season started early with a dominant H3N2 strain, which was last seen a decade ago, in 2002-03. That year, the flu season also ended early

Because of the holiday season, Frieden said the data may have been skewed.

For instance, Connecticut appeared to be having a lighter flu season than other northeastern states at the end of December, but the state said it could have been a result of college winter break. College student health centers account for a large percentage of flu reports in Connecticut, but they've been closed since the fall semester ended, said William Gerrish, a spokesman for the state's department of public health.

The flu season arrived about a month early this year in parts of the South and the East, but it may only just be starting to take hold of states in the West, Frieden said. California is still showing "minimal" flu on the CDC's map, but that doesn't mean it will stay that way.

Click here to read about how flu has little to do with cold weather.

"It's not surprising. Influenza ebbs and flows during the flu season," Frieden said. "The only thing predictable about the flu is that it is unpredictable."

Dr. William Schaffner, chair of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn., said he was expecting California's seeming good luck with the flu to be over this week.

"Flu is fickle, we say," Schaffner said. "Influenza can be spotty. It can be more severe in one community than another for reasons incompletely understood."

Early CDC estimates indicate that this year's flu vaccine is 62 percent effective, meaning people who have been vaccinated are 62 percent less likely to need to see a doctor for flu treatment, Frieden said.

Although the shot has been generally believed to be more effective for children than adults, there's not enough data this year to draw conclusions yet.

"The flu vaccine is far from perfect, but it's still by far the best tool we have to prevent flu," Frieden said, adding that most of the 130 million vaccine doses have already been administered. "We're hearing of shortages of the vaccine, so if you haven't been vaccinated and want to be, it's better late than never."

Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/flu-lets-slightly-cdc-report-vaccine-62-percent/story?id=18190530

Flu Season Has Boston Declaring Health Emergency

Boston declared a public health emergency Wednesday as the city tried to deal with a harsh flu season and the state reported 18 flu-related deaths so far.

The city is working with health care centers to offer free flu vaccines and also hopes to set up places where people can get vaccinated. The city said there had been four flu-related deaths, all elderly residents, since the unofficial start of the flu season on Oct. 1.

Menino said there had been about 700 confirmed cases of the flu in Boston so far this season, compared with 70 all of last season.

Massachusetts was one of 29 states reporting high levels of "influenza-like illness," according to the most recent weekly flu advisory issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The CDC said the proportion of people visiting health care providers with flu-like symptoms climbed from 2.8 percent to 5.6 percent in four weeks. By contrast, the rate peaked at only 2.2 percent during the relatively mild 2011-2012 flu season.

The estimated rate of flu-related hospitalizations in the U.S. was 8.1 per 100,000 people, which is high for this time of year, according to Dr. Joe Bresee, chief of the epidemiology and prevention branch of the CDC's influenza division. The agency's next advisory will be issued Friday.

"This is the worst flu season we've seen since 2009, and people should take the threat of flu seriously," Menino said in a statement. "This is not only a health concern, but also an economic concern for families, and I'm urging residents to get vaccinated if they haven't already."
Menino also urged people to stay home from work or school if they are sick.

Frederica Williams, president of the Whittier Street Health Center in Boston's inner-city Roxbury neighborhood, said her facility had opened a special flu clinic and was using social media and sending letters to residents urging them to come in and get flu shots.

"We serve a vulnerable population that is at risk for all kinds of health issues, so we put out a broadcast to our patients even before the mayor made the (emergency) announcement because we saw an increase in the number of people coming to our clinic for services."

Williams estimates that the number of patients who have come to the clinic seeking treatment for flu-like symptoms is triple that of the same time a year later.

Hospitals around the state were also taking precautions to protect patients and staff from exposure to the flu.

Baystate Health, which operates Baystate Medical Center in Springfield and two other hospitals in western Massachusetts, announced Wednesday that it was changing its visitor policy. The hospitals will no longer allow visitors younger than 14 and are recommending no more than two people visit a patient at one time.

"This is the worst in several years," said Dr. Sarah Haessler, an infectious disease specialist at Baystate. She said the flu outbreak has strained the hospital's resources and helped to fill its beds to capacity.

Nationally, health officials have been urging people to get flu shots while cautioning that vaccines will not guarantee prevention of all illnesses. But 91 percent of the flu viruses that have been analyzed by the CDC were include in the 2012-2013 influenza vaccine.

"I hate needles, and I got (a shot)," Gov. Deval Patrick said Wednesday, adding that he was not aware of any shortages of vaccine in the state. He also reminded residents to use common sense, such as washing their hands and sneezing into their sleeves.

As of Friday's report, the CDC said 18 children had died from the flu so far this season. While the CDC does not keep a tab of deaths overall from the flu, it estimates that 24,000 Americans die each year.

BECOME A MEMBER Access our very best investigative reporting, opinion and commentary. Ayurvedic medicine aims to correct energy balance

Q: Is ayurvedic medicine a safe approach to managing health?

A: Ayurvedic medicine is a holistic approach to health care that is considered a form of alternative medicine in the U.S. It includes a variety of practices that may be beneficial. However, at this time, there's limited scientific evidence that shows ayurvedic medicine to be a safe and effective way to manage one's health overall.

At its core, ayurvedic medicine seeks to assess and correct energy imbalance. The assessment is done using questions that address an individual's symptoms, predispositions, environment and physical state. It also includes checking a person's pulse, examining the tongue and making several other physical evaluations. Based on the assessment, the practitioner determines an individual's state of energy imbalance.

This approach is somewhat different from the methods of medical diagnosis used in Western medicine. It's a very holistic way of looking at a person. The assumption is that everything in your life has an impact on your health, including choices like diet and exercise. But it also involves factors such as your day-to-day surroundings and environment, as well as your job, friends, family and emotions.

For example, from an ayurvedic medicine perspective, a person who has asthma may be experiencing that condition because he is too hot. A patient with a chronic cough and cold may be congested because she's predisposed to thick secretions. Someone with heartburn may have high metabolism.

To treat these problems, an ayurvedic practitioner attempts to correct the energy imbalance. That could involve eliminating or adding a variety of elements to a person's life, including certain foods, dietary supplements, exercise or meditation. In some cases, people may be encouraged to change their environment.

Millions of people around the world use ayurvedic medicine. But the research on it right now is very limited. Small studies have looked at ayurvedic dietary supplements and botanicals for conditions like diabetes and osteoarthritis. Early results have shown some efficacy. But larger clinical trials are needed to confirm those results.

No formal credentialing system exists in the U.S. for ayurvedic medicine practitioners. That means there is no guarantee that someone who claims to be an ayurvedic doctor actually has credible qualifications or specific training.

Finding safe ayurvedic products can be a problem too. One study that examined imported ayurvedic dietary supplements and botanicals found that up to one-third were contaminated, some with heavy metals.

With these limitations, it is difficult to recommend ayurvedic medicine as an overall approach to health care at this point. That said, it clearly contains some beneficial aspects. For example, yoga, deep breathing and meditation are common components of ayurvedic medicine. All have been shown to be useful for many health conditions. Some ayurvedic dietary approaches may also be helpful.

Find out more

Ayurvedic training in India culminates in either a bachelor's degree (bachelor of ayurvedic medicine and surgery, BAMS) or doctoral degree (doctor of ayurvedic medicine and surgery, DAMS). Before you find a qualified practitioner or move forward with any recommended treatment, talk to your primary doctor to make sure doing so fits your situation and is safe for you.