The San Jose Mercury News (of Silicon Valley in California) has an article on a novel "experiment' that is being conducted by folks from the Stanford Hospital in anticipation of the H1N1/Swine flu epidemic that is expected to re-surface in force in the fall: because so many people in California have cars, people with suspected flu will be handled by a "drive through" screening process which will keep people in their cars until a determination can be made as to whether they actually have flu (if they have flu, they are allowed to drive on to be admitted to the hospital, otherwise directed elsewhere for services). See:
http://www.mercurynews.com/stanford/ci_12580052?source=sphere_article This may become a model for certain parts of the country as an attempt to reduce the chaos that is likely to occur in Emergency Departments when the flu strikes though it probably wan't work for major metropolitan areas that rely on mass transit. In a somewhat related story, there is an interesting news article on two pregnant women who fied from H1N1 flu. The article explains how the flu causes significant problems for pregnant women and makes some recommendations. See: http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_12952961?source=most_viewed Finally, I'd like to recommend John Barry's book "The Great Influenza". It's main focus is the 1917 H1N1 flu (an ancestor of our current flu) but covers a large number of topics in providing the context for understanding events leading up to the pandemic and some of the long term consequences of trying to understand the H1N1 virus. For example, as a prelude, Barry provides a history of how 19th century medicine was converted from a profession that a person with only a high school diploma could practice into a scientifically based profession (with the development of the Johns Hopkins Medical School, the creation of the Rockefeller Institute [now Rockefeller University], funding for scienfitic projects by the Rockefeller foundation [NOTE: John D. Ford funded much of this while relying upon a personal physician who practice homeopathy], and the establishment of the "Journal of Experimental Medicine" which was started in 1896 and is still published today -- the entire run (except the recent six months) is available on PubMed at: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/tocrender.fcgi?action=archive&journal=483 Research on the H1N1 flu proved to be very difficult, both because of the significant impact of the flu on literally everyone and mis-steps in understanding it (it was first thought that is was a bacteria infection but only later recognized as a virus). However, one of the researchers persisted in studying the virus, and as a result, Oswald Avery reeached the conclusion that genes had to be made up of DNA (a position most researchers did not initially accept). A quick overview of Avery's contribution is provided on Wikipedia (NOTE: do not hold it against him that he was a Canadian): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oswald_Avery (NOTE: Avery's paper arguing for DNA as the basis of genes was published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine and there is a link to it on the Wiki site). Barry provides more background and context on Avery's research and well as the other researchers fundamentally affected the nature of medical research in the 20th century. Parts of Barry's book is available on books.google.com at: http://books.google.com/books?id=BYsW6qTP0pMC&dq=%22the+great+influena%22 It might be useful to read it before the fire next time. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
