Flu, Swine Flu | featured news

Health officials said almost 100 children have died from the flu, known as H1N1, and 46 states now have widespread flu activity.

Nearly 5,000 people have reportedly died from swine flu since it emerged this year and developed into a global epidemic, the World Health Organization said Friday....

Because of the risks from flu, they should be among the first in line to get both the H1N1 and seasonal influenza shots, medical experts say. Yet many are averse to vaccinations or medication.

As the H1N1 influenza vaccine trickles into clinics and pharmacies over the next few weeks, public health officials and doctors desperately hope that pregnant women will be at the front of the line for the shot.

With no signs of the H1N1 virus slowing down, the flu strain continues to hit children and teens in larger numbers than any other age group, and researchers are at a loss to explain why. According to The Associated Press, 11 children have died from H1N1 just in the past week, raising the total to 86 since the flu strain first hit. 43 of those deaths have occurred in the past two months alone.

Swine flu is believed to have killed 19 children the week ending Oct. 3, bringing the number of pediatric deaths to 76 since ...

Mary Peterson of Des Moines, Washington, doesn't believe the vaccine for the novel H1N1 flu has been studied enough to get it for herself and her daughters, who are 1 and 3 years old.

One quarter of Americans sick enough to be hospitalized with swine flu last spring wound up needing intensive care and 7 percent of them died, the first such study of the early months of the global epidemic suggests. That's a little higher than with ordinary seasonal flu, several experts said....

For 13-year-old Brandon Marti, the intranasal vaccine felt "good," "cold" and "watery" at the Children's Hospital at Montefiore in the Bronx, New York, on Tuesday.

Fast-food places have them. Banks and pharmacies do, too. Now hospitals are opening drive-thrus and drive-up tent clinics to screen and treat a swelling tide of swine flu patients.

European healthcare regulators recommended two swine flu vaccines for approval on Friday, clearing the way for mass vaccination programs to start imminently.