Talk:2009 swine flu pandemic/Archive 7

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Aclaratory notes at the end of table

I think those aclaratory notes about the understimation of US cases are not neccesary since that apllies to any country. Also there is a complete article about US out there. I am going to erase them if no one complains. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.21.59.220 (talk) 23:57, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Avian influenza is endemic in poultry

This is slightly off-topic, but the current article mentions that "the H5N1 strain is and has been for years endemic in poultry in countries like China, Indonesia, Vietnam and Egypt", even when the listed sources do not say so. According to Wikipedia "In epidemiology, an infection is said to be endemic (from Greek en- in or within + demos people) in a population when that infection is maintained in the population without the need for external inputs."

Note that an article on the FAO website states that: "Much remains unknown about the survival of H5N1 HPAI viruses in wild bird populations, including the important question of whether infection is sustained in these without replenishment from other sources, especially infected domestic poultry." http://www.fao.org/avianflu/documents/key_ai/key_book_ch3.5.htm#3.5

In other words, it is NOT known whether the current strain of H5N1 is endemic in wild birds or not, but it IS known that it is endemic in poultry. For example note that the FAO July/08 report mentions that: "Egypt has formally informed the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) that avian influenza is endemic throughout the country's poultry."

An answer to the question "where do you think the poultry are getting the H5N1 from?": H5N1 is endemic in poultry (see e.g. the FAO comment regarding the situation in Egypt), which means that the virus is maintained in poultry without the need for external inputs. To put it simply: poultry is getting the virus from other poultry. The current strain of H5N1 was possibly or probably originally created when a low-pathogenic strain mutated after it had come in contact with poultry, but there seems to be no evidence that the current strain of H5N1 would be endemic in wild birds (if you have a source that says so, please include it in the article, those that are there now do not say so). Uad473 (talk) 20:37, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

tHERE IS CONSIDERABLE EVIDENCE THAT ASIAN-LINAGE hpai h1n5 IS ENDEMIC IN WILD BIRDS, BUT NO PROOF SO AS YOU SAY, IT IS AN OPEN QUESTION OF WHETHER OR NOT IF THAT STRAIN WERE WIPED OUT IN POULTRY THEN WOULD IT ALSO DIE OUT IN THE WILD BIRD POPULATION. oN THE OTHER HAND, IT IS ALSO AN OPEN QUESTION OF WHETHER THE REASON THE STRAIN HAS NOT BEEN WIPED OUT IN POULTRY IS ITS CONTINUED ENDEMIC STATUS IN WILD BIRDS. pERHAPS IT SHOULD JUST SAY "BIRDS" NOT EITHER "POULTRY" OR "WILD BIRDS" SINCE ALL AGREE THAT IT IS ENDEMIC IN BIRDS IN CERTAIN AREAS; IT IS JUST UNCERTAIN THE EXACT ROLE BEING PLAYED BY WILD BIRDS. wE KNOW WILD BIRDS CAN CATCH IT FROM POULTRY AND VICE VERSA. aLSO HUMANS CAN CATCH IT FROM WILD BIRDS. aLSO, THE MOST COMMON WAY IT IS SPREAD IS VIA THE POULTRY INDUSTRY RATHER THAN WILD BIRDS. Sorry about the all-caps - I accidentally hit caps-lock and was not looking at the screen. WAS 4.250 (talk) 20:51, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

:::He was trying to say- “There is considerable evidence that Asian-linage HPAI H1N5 is endemic in wild birds, but no proof so as you say, it is an open question of whether or not if that strain were wiped out in poultry then would it also die out in the wild bird population. On the other hand, it is also an open question of whether the reason the strain has not been wiped out in poultry is its continued endemic status in wild birds. Perhaps it should just say "birds" not either "poultry" or "wild birds" since all agree that it is endemic in birds in certain areas; it is just uncertain the exact role being played by wild birds. We know wild birds can catch it from poultry and vice versa. Also humans can catch it from wild birds. also, the most common way it is spread is via the poultry industry rather than wild birds. WAS 4.250 (talk)”--86.25.4.169 (talk) 15:52, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

It's important to distinguish ordinary H5N1 from HPAI H5N1 when reading these sources. Both are seasonal, but due to its lethality, HPAI is self-limiting and more easily detected in surveillance. See doi:10.3201/eid1503.081190. HPAI was recently found in coastal central Peru. See doi:10.3201/eid1506.080981. LeadSongDog come howl 16:02, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

It is important to distinghish between asian-linage HPAI H5N1 (the strain capable of killing humans, cats, and spreading in wild birds - a strain that has done many things experts thought no flu strain could do), H5N1 (a subtype known for many decades that occationally mutates from LPAI in wild birds to HPAI in poultry), HPAI (includes non-H1N5 subtypes), and HPAI H5N1 (non-asian-linage strains occationally occur in poultry and when all the poultry are killed, the strain dies out too - asian-linage stain spread to wild water fowl and has not been able to be wiped out). WAS 4.250 (talk) 19:26, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

2009 flu pandemic in Chile

Why does this article exist? This article duplicates the section in 2009 flu pandemic in South America, with no further elaboration or expansion, that section is not so large as to require a breakout article. - 70.29.212.226 (talk) 02:34, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia being created as you watch. We are not done yet. At any time you may see content that is in the process of becoming an encyclopedia article, rather than a finished encyclopedia article. The pandemic is far from over, and between now and when it is, that article may well have additional content added to it. You can help. You can add sourced relevant content to it. WAS 4.250 (talk) 18:56, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

this is because it is waiting to be expanded by translating from the spanish version.190.21.59.220 (talk) 23:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Exactly, it's like a little help for those who dont know how to write an article, and now they can expand the article from the Spanish Wiki.--Vrysxy! (talk) 02:38, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

It has existed for a week, and is still a copy of the section in the continent article. This indicates that there is not much participation willing to expand the Chile article. Since it exactly replicates the section in another article, and that section isn't long enough to justify a breakout article of its own, there seems to be very little reason for its existence, all work could just be done at the section in the continent article, until it is sufficient length to justify an article of its own. 70.29.212.226 (talk) 05:21, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

very US biased

Even though there is a split off article for US content, this article seems still to be focused on US data. There is a "rest of the world" out there. Spanglej (talk) 23:05, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

The bias you claim is hard to find in the article. Please be more specific. Did you even note that the U.S. has suffered the most deaths of any country? Also note that the U.S. has far more confirmed cases than any other country at this point. For us to conceal this would be unencyclopedic. That said, I encourage you to edit the article and correct any errors or failures to comply with policies or guidelines you see. Please use explanatory edit summaries. At any time the article is semiprotected, you may request such edits on this page. (edited)Edison (talk) 03:59, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Deaths in the world

So can someone update the world deaths map to account for deaths since the last update?

• Honduras
• Philippines

70.29.212.226 (talk) 07:51, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Maps of Argentina

• 
  H1N1 Argentina Map.svg
  Deaths/Confirmed/Suspected map
• 
  H1N1 Argentina map by confirmed cases.svg
  Confirmed cases map
• 
  H1N1 Argentina deaths.svg
  Death count map

The maps of Argentina contain Antarctica... but AFAIK, Argentina respects the Antarctic treaty, is a treaty member, etc... Why does the map contain Antarctica then?

And Antarctica is colored in, does anyone have information on confirmed cases in Antarctica?

70.29.212.226 (talk) 08:26, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Unreliable data in symtoms and expected severity section

Commenting on this passage:

"Most cases mild Evidence mounted through May 2009 that the symptoms were milder than health officials initially feared. As of May 27, 2009, most of the 342 confirmed cases in New York City had been mild and there had been only 23 confirmed deaths from the virus.[192] Similarly, Japan had reported 279, mostly mild flu cases, and no deaths,[193] with the government reopening schools as of May 23, stating that the "virus should be considered more like a seasonal flu."[194] Furthermore, Australia has had upwards of 1500 cases with no deaths. In Mexico, where the outbreak began in April, Mexico City officials lowered their swine flu alert level as no new cases had been reported for a week.[195]"

We are reporting highly unreliable data here. Quoted figures have the following problems:

1) Deaths lag infections. If someone dies from seasonal flu (and probably swine flu too) that death may occur more than a week after they were infected. Simply put some of your sample (or most in some countries) may not have had a chance to die yet as they have only just been infected (or the reports of their death may not yet be confirmed).

2) Developing world bias. Flu is typically much more deadly in the underdeveloped world. Most reported infections so far are in developed countries (apart from Mexico which is being ignored here anyway).

3) Countries may not be reporting all detected deaths. Governments (especially restrictive ones) may take action to avoid any deaths being reported. There is a strong economic motive to hide bad news.

4) As none of this data has been controlled for demographic profiles and quality of treatment given there are numerous other possible sources of bias here.

I recommend that we drop this passage or replace it with one using credible sources regarding severity. This must surely mean peer reviewed studies or at least statements by qualified epidemiologists (and the WHO). I note that the WHO ranks this disease as of moderate severity and the CFR has been credibly estimated at 0.4% (which is lower than Spanish flu but relatively high compared to Hong Kong flu and the seasonal flu). Barnaby dawson (talk) 11:28, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

No original research. We report what reliable published sources say; and if they differ we report that. Reliable sources are saying what the above quote says. It is being reported as somewhere between seasonal flu and hong kong flu - so far - with concerns about what the severity will be like in poorer countries. We'll know much more in a month or two. WAS 4.250 (talk) 15:45, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

The CFR estimate of 0.4% (for swine flu) is higher than at least one estimate (0.1%) of Hong Kong flu's. I don't know what other peer reviewed sources are known giving estimates for these though. I'm not claiming its original research. I just think it would be better with fewer dubious numbers and more balance. Barnaby dawson (talk) 21:48, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Authors of the article that calculated 0.4% CFR had warned that this figure is only preliminary and may lack accuracy. Peer review comments on the article also stated this CFR could be "off by magnitudes". The 0.4% CFR figure was calculated using 'confirmed + suspected deaths' from Mexico during late April. If confirmed deaths are used, the figure is only 1/10th or 0.04%. We now know many suspected cases in late April in Mexico turned out to be NOT H1N1, making this figure's accuracy very dubious. IMHO , no data is better than bad data that could be off by 10 or even 100 times. 75.42.196.118 (talk) 18:29, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Using only confirmed deaths is just as likely to cause errors and we have no other scientific study into the matter. There are reasons it might be an overestimate but there are also reasons it might be an underestimate. For one thing the true number of deaths is probably higher than just the confirmed number (and will include deaths which were not even suspected of being caused by H1N1). But your argument supports my contention that we should not rely on the reported figures because those figures are much more problematic than those used in this scientific article. We should use the best available sources and in this case (for the time being) that means this article (with qualifiers from other sources explaining to our readers that any figures are highly uncertain at the moment). Hopefully more articles will come out and then we can balance them against each other. Barnaby dawson (talk) 08:26, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

The article says "The case fatality rate (CFR) of the pandemic strain is estimated at 0.4% (range 0.3%-1.8%)" . The wordings are far too assertive than desirable. This is only one of the estimates, it is preliminary and known by authors and reviewers that is potentially off by 10 or 100 times. 75.42.196.118 (talk) 16:51, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Where are the other peer reviewed estimates? I would like to see them included. Please give links. Barnaby dawson (talk) 15:07, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I've added a qualifier sentence to address your concern. Barnaby dawson (talk) 15:13, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Removal of text need - false statements.

"The H1N1 strain was first introduced to Australia by Mr Sol Trujillo [176] through the imporation of mexican pigs"

Fake source - this is copied from a TV sketch in Australia. Not factual.

Smoko (talk) 07:37, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

"Over 1 Million Cases in US" - CDC report

[1] and [2] both discus this from the issue from the CDC. This should be added somewhere, and probably mentioned in the template, similar to when the CDC was saying there were more than 100,000 cases in April/May. Der.Gray (talk) 22:28, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I already add it to a subsection. WAS 4.250 (talk) 22:52, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Zoonosis map

So, should we add the zoonosis map to the article? 70.29.212.226 (talk) 08:21, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't think so. There is very little information on this and the location of such spreading is not as important as whether it is happening at all. |→ Spaully ^τ 12:43, 20 June 2009 (GMT)

Cases in Italy.

Last night 6 more cases in new flu were confirmed in Italy. The total is now 102. I should know... I live there!

Poor git, I really feel sorry for you; Silvio Berlusconi 'is' a Mafia don!--86.25.1.16 (talk) 09:21, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Template:2009 flu pandemic world map

What's up with the weird template map of the world? Template:2009 flu pandemic world map It duplicates part of the current 2009 flu template, is very large, and doesn't link to countries. 76.66.203.200 (talk) 04:52, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Proposed article move

A proposal is afoot to move the 'country' article to a more appropriate location. Thoughts? Bosonic dressing (talk) 10:15, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

World map in "reponse" section

Map shows countries in grey and orange but legend doesn't explain what the orange means. I assume grey means no data available. Tiddy (talk) 07:27, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Hungary should be red on the map

They have confirmed cases and they should be red on the map (west of red Romania, north of yellow Croatia).

07:27, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

"Swine flu" still the most common name

Ugh! Not again! Yeah, but I've noticed that the majority of mainline news media are now regularly using the "swine flu" name in both articles and headlines. Almost every article that covered the CDCs recent estimate of 1 million cases, including the NY Times, Forbes, AP, ABC, and countless newspapers and TV stations, are using it in their headline. A quick count of Google hits over the last week for the word "flu" showed that 70% were part of "swine flu."

I've personally stopped thinking about the name, but whenever I review Google news stories about health, there are numerous articles about "swine flu" and they all have a related link to this article, which almost seems too general in comparison and somewhat detached from the common terminology being used. Here is a quick search of news over the last week for the word "flu" by itself. Notice how "swine flu" is the most used title.

I wonder if it's wise to have another poll and reconsider the name. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 05:11, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

COMMONNAME says we should defer to the other naming conventions if they are available, and we've got MOSMED which says you shouldn't do original research like comparing Google hits. And if there's a naming dispute we should consult with what the recognised authorities and organisations call them. So let's see:

• WHO - Influenza A(H1N1)

That's it for the international bodies. Since we're here anyway let's also look at what US government agencies call this:

• CDC - H1N1 flu
• FDA - 2009 H1N1 flu
• HHS - H1N1 flu

As far as I know none of those US-based news agencies you listed falls under recognized authorities and organizations on medicine-related subjects. Unless you've got a bright idea on why we shouldn't follow MOSMED in this case I don't think it's wise at all to do another revote. --Aeon17x (talk) 11:23, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

The point is: the article is not using MOSMED, as you show by the list of names. The article simply calls this a "flu." There are other MOSMED-related sources that use the common name, such as WebMD. In any case, MOSMED also states "Write for the average reader and a general audience—not professionals or patients."

One of the negatives of the current name is that it appears to use the name "flu" as an adjective by shifting the focus to "pandemic," with "flu" as the type of. It seems better to have the title focus on the disease itself, especially when it's unique. So if the article is not going to use the medical name, why not use the most easily recognized name per naming guidelines instead of a "noname" compromise? --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 18:03, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

For starters, WebMD isn't an internationally recognized body for medical standards; they're not even listed anywhere in MOSMED, there's no use citing what they say on this and either way they don't override what the WHO or US government agencies call the disease. Second, MOSMED first says that "Article titles use the scientific or medical name" rather than the lay term and provide a whole section in the manual for that. Writing for the average reader takes second precedence and pertains to the actual article content and not the article title.

The simple 'flu' title is not a "noname" compromise, it does identify the pandemic correctly and doesn't go against what the MOSMED says. Just because it doesn't follow the MOSMED the whole way doesn't justify that we shouldn't follow the MOSMED at all and go with the common name. --Aeon17x (talk) 00:52, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

It is a question of context. In a news context one is taking about something current. In an encyclopedia one must distinguish between similar yet different things and Pandemic flu, H1N1, swine flu, 2009 pandemic flu, and the 2009 pandemic flu virus are different things and so the title of this article needs to reflect that. Inside this article we need to point out that it is commonly called "swine flu", so we do. Within this article we need to be clear about what we are talking about - and saying "swine flu virus" when we mean the 2009 pandemic flu virus rather than all the flu virus strains that have been endemic in pigs is simply being incorrect. Newspaper companies exist to make a profit, we are here to create an accurate encyclopedia. The average Wikipedia article is more accurate than the average newspaper article. Let's keep it that way. WAS 4.250 (talk) 22:54, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

inaccurate info again

As I said, I love this page, but there is someone really trying to spoil it, and that someone is editing the page. Please find that person and stop him/her.

That person again listed Croatia. There is no swine flu there, yet. There has never been.

The reference, ECDC report (#2), has never put Croatia on the list.

Let's do everything to keep the list accurate.

Julian (gotname@thenetthing.com) Gotname (talk) 15:00, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Forget Croatia and put it as a- 'alleged', 'rumoured', 'suspected' or 'unproven' claims only, like Senegal's case is on one of the maps, and be done with it.--86.25.5.79 (talk) 09:56, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, there are no 'alleged' cases in Croatia, but in this case, it doesn't matter. What matters is the fake reference. ECDC report, given as the reference, doesn't report it!

If there is some relevant reference for 'unproven' claims, let's have it. Kidding. What we need here is accurate information. Julian (talk) 16:20, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

swine flu spreading

How long do swine flu germs last on contaminated surfaces? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.94.95.98 (talk) 13:57, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

That's a topic for the article on the virus, not the one on the pandemic.LeadSongDog come howl 15:02, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

-Many days if it is cold. Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 22:22, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

See Influenza#Transmission. Tim Vickers (talk) 19:14, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

About 36 hours for rhinovirus.--86.25.4.169 (talk) 15:30, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Oxivir Virucidal kills most rhinovirus that live in U.K. and Finnish cafes!--86.25.12.173 (talk) 09:04, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Time to move the country case count table into units of thousands (k)

Given the discrepencies between the various reported totals, the last 3 digits of the country cases is now statistically meaningless. This is especially so given media reports that actual cases may be more than one million. Also, the "Laboratory Confirmed" criterion is now also meaningless, given that as part of the shift of many countries away from the 'containment' phase, they have stopped performing laboratory testing on every suspected case.

I suggest that as an interim step, the left column be changed to units of thousands. Then we can have a re-think about what criterion to use going forward. --Savlonn (talk) 17:26, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Discussion of the table should be at the template page - Template talk:2009 flu pandemic table. I have copied this section to there. |→ Spaully ^τ 17:42, 27 June 2009 (GMT)

Still, there's a difference between 0 and 999. There are countries with no cases, and many of those with just a few cases. One means a lot somewhere (so sorry it's 1,000 for you), and getting as accurate information as possible is what matters (it is statistically relevant, too).

If some countries stop reporting, or testing mild cases (as the U.S.A), there's a problem. We do have it with mostly affected countries (U.S.A and Mexico). However, having thousands of cases in your country does not make 1,000 just 1. Not yet. Not soon (I hope). Julian (talk) 07:05, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

500,000 swine flu cases in NY

WAS, in deleting the NY case estimate, you wrote that "too many inaccuracies were added. example half a million New Yorkers reported flu like symptoms not having the pandemic flu -only half of flu-like illness is flu." As the material removed was cited: "New York City swine flu case tally could be as high as 500,000, CDC says", I didn't understand your rationale. Hopefully there wasn't any OR implied. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 23:27, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

As part of the research that went into the conclusion that the US has about 1 million cases of pandemic flu, the researchers called people at random in new york city and asked them if they had flu symptoms lately. Based on their answers, they projected the proportion of respondents that said they had flu symptoms and concluded that something like half a million new yorkers had flu symptoms lately, not that half a million had pandemic flu. This is research that was used for their conclusion of 1 million in the US. It is original research and invalid to make conclusions that the researchers did not make. About half of flu-like illness is not caused by flu and not all flu is pandemic flu. WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:23, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

That source claims:"The CDC study found that 6.9% of city residents had flu-like illness during a three-week period in May. Based on virologic testing, the researchers "knew that most of that influenza-like illness was based on this new H1N1 strain," Schuchat said. "And from that," Schuchat continued, "they estimated that around half a million New York City residents may have been infected with this new virus and had flu-like illness without necessarily seeking care."" which claims that the researchers did make that claim. I read a different source that did not say the above and thought that was the source being used here. My mistake. Sorry. WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:31, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Newspaper reporters get stuff wrong a lot, and I still did not quite believe it so I did a little research and found this:

" I want to mention that in New York City, they did a community survey that suggest the 6.9% of New Yorkers had experienced a flu-like illness during a three-week period in may when from their viralic testing they knew pretty much that most of that influenza-like illness was cause by this new H1N1 strain. They estimated from that about half a million New York City residents may have been infected with this new virus and had that kind of flu-like illness without getting a test or necessarily seeking care. We have carried out similar kinds of phone surveys of communities and we've also been doing some household surveys where there are individuals who are ill looking at the secondary rates in the household. There are communities not driven by the household that came up for the 6% estimate and that's not for the country as a whole, has is for a couple of places where we saw the outbreak really spread through a community. So, we don't know whether many, many, many or every community in the country will go through that kind of experience next year or not. Now, when you compare this to seasonal influenza, I think an important feature is that seasonal influenza is usually happening over weeks to months in a cold winter environment. And we don't know exactly whether what we've seen in the communities that were affected in the spring and summer is like what those same kind of communities would experience in a winter scenario. The attack rate of 6% is low for the seasonal influenza, but it's just a several-week attack rate. That New York City estimate was three weeks in the entire city of New York. So, I think that we believe the attack rates of this new virus, particularly in young people, may exceed the kind of attack rates that we see with seasonal influenza, but one other feature that's important is that we aren't seeing illness in the elderly, even in our household studies, we're really seeing the people over 65 in particular and probably people in their 50s are less likely to get ill with this virus even when they're in a family with somebody who has it." - http://www.cdc.gov/media/transcripts/2009/t090626.htm - WAS 4.250 (talk) 01:05, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Added to that, it was just a few weeks ago when the CDC announced that there were more like 100,000 cases, not 20,000 they estimated, which also made the headlines. Then it jumps to a million this week, more headlines, and a day later estimates half a million in just New York. So much for estimates. One thing I'm curious about is whether people who catch the new virus will now have immunity for a while and not need the vaccine when it comes out. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 03:52, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

That's easy to answer. If you catch the virus, you'll be immune for quite a while. No need for vaccine. If it kills you, you'll never ever catch anything else. In the meantime, hope for the best. Julian (talk) 06:13, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

100,000 seems a bit big to me; China has only 1,000 victims, the UK is at 4,000, while both Canada and Chile have only about 7,000 each and Mexico is scoring in at about 8,000!!!--86.25.12.173 (talk) 08:53, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Please remove French Guinea on the world map

No cases have been reported there. It's been listed as confirmed since forever. Can someone please remove it?

CaninePitDog (talk) 02:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

I understand you and I'm with you. I've been trying to make someone remove Croatia from the list twice. It worked, but it took some time. It should be removed from the map, too... French Guinea is not on the list (that's good), just on the map?

I suppose there are malicious people making fake reports here, or even changing the page. That's why there are mistakes. People who make maps, follow the given info at the time...

I wish there were a way to stop fake people giving fake information. Julian (talk) 05:46, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Syria

Syria has just announced the first confirmed case in the country. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.116.219.101 (talk) 12:31, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

No Swine flu in Croatia, not yet, not yesterday

I love this page of yours (and many others). Congratulations! Once, you put one confirmed Croatian case, and removed it. No such flu case in Croatia yet, not confirmed. This time, it's been there for a day or two...

No Croatian TV reported it, and it's not even mentioned in your ECDC reference (#2).

Keep your information accurate.

Congratulations again!

Julian (julian@thenetthing.com)

07:27, 27 June 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.66.193.20 (talk)

Croatia update 1

Croatia is flu free [[3]]!--86.25.4.169 (talk) 15:40, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Croatia update 2

Oh, yes it has [[4]]! --86.25.0.22 (talk) 18:58, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

See this to- [[5]]--86.25.1.16 (talk) 09:17, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

"Oh yes it has" is no argument, and the sources listed by you are highly unreliable. As of June 27, there are no cases in Croatia, and the reference on the page does not mention it. I can explain why your source is wrong, I can also tell you that an infected person passed through Croatia, or that one survivor of the flu came to Croatia from Chile, but it's all irrelevant. What's relevant is that somebody put Croatia on the list, twice, giving the false reference. Julian (talk) 05:20, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

The CBC is usually a reliable source. 70.83.220.148 (talk) 18:08, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, CBC is reliable, so is ECBC, but they never mentioned Croatia, and somebody referenced them as source even if they weren't. Hence, that was a case of deliberate misinformation. Julian (talk) 09:49, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

US POV

The quarantine section has a high US POV-ness. 70.29.212.226 (talk) 08:05, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I'll sort it out for you!--86.25.1.16 (talk) 09:19, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

It is not POV. I quote this passage-

Other governments have taken or threatened similar quarantine actions: The government of Australia ordered a cruise ship with 2000 passengers to stay at sea because of a swine flu threat; Egyptians who went on the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca risked being quarantined upon their return.

It later goes on to even mention Taiwan, Mongolia and Russia!--86.25.12.173 (talk) 09:18, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

The entire "Travel Alerts" subsection is a US-POV. 76.66.193.20 (talk) 06:03, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I'll look.--86.25.8.152 (talk) 17:40, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

World updates

Ethiopia source

Read this, it's gripping stuff!- [6]! --86.25.5.79 (talk) 09:59, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Inner Mongolia/Mongolia update

Swine and bird flu are not in Mongolia, but some more cases of both are reported in Inner Mongolia [7]/ [8]. They are apparently not connected and the local chickens are now being inoculated.

--86.25.5.79 (talk) 09:56, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Sudan update

Neither flu is in Sudan, but it's on guard agaist swine flu coming in via the airports or over the Ethiopian border! [9]/[10]/[11]/[12]--86.25.5.79 (talk) 10:08, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

New Zealand update

Another case in NZ [[13]]! No Maoris have fallen ill or died so far- only Anglos and Polynesians appear to get it! -86.25.0.22 (talk) 19:34, 25 June 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.25.8.152 (talk)

Chime?!--86.25.8.152 (talk) 18:13, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

This is very interesting. I haven't seen genetic differences being discussed when it comes to getting the flu, but the idea came to my mind when I was watching the map few days ago. Julian (talk) 10:04, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Map

BLACK: deaths; RED: confirmed cases; YELLOW: suspected cases

Why is there only deaths in the west and south of Australia, in non Inuit/Amerindian parts of Canada, around the River Plate and in the USA except for the Negro dominated states like Georgian and in the remote mountain states like Montanna?!--86.25.4.217 (talk) 09:47, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Why is only S.E. China is ill in the whole of the mighty nation?!--86.25.4.217 (talk) 09:51, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Bio-weapons?!--86.25.4.217 (talk) 09:53, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Yep!!!--86.25.5.103 (talk) 10:23, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Bio-weapons, as if! What a load of bull-shit!--86.25.14.224 (talk) 10:06, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

i'm not entering in the discussioon, I just want to talk about the map: I've creadted the map, but I haven't put all the information on it, this fase is just to express the idea that I had. You can see the discussion about the creation of two new maps, more up in this page João P. M. Lima (talk) 10:41, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem with such a world map is that the UK isn't reporting by normal political subdivisions... and Singapore isn't reporting by subdivision at all. 76.66.193.20 (talk) 22:11, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Macedonian update

1 person may have it [14]! --86.25.15.120 (talk) 11:23, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

The former Yugoslavia

Only Kosovo and Croatia (?) have 0 cases so far--86.25.15.120 (talk) 11:23, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

UK updates

Welsh update

13 Taffys now have swine flue[15].--86.25.12.173 (talk) 08:41, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Scottish update

A Scots bloke has now died of it [16]! --86.25.12.235 (talk) 13:14, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Birmingham, UK update

A Brummie is now dead of it [17]--86.25.8.152 (talk) 17:44, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

A girl is dead [18]--86.25.4.217 (talk) 09:15, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The same one as above. The UK has had 3 deaths to date. |→ Spaully ^τ 09:20, 1 July 2009 (GMT)

Deaths are all inaccurate and unsourced

For one thing 18,000 people haven't died of this flu —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.170.11.3 (talk) 07:48, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Everything in this article is cited by reliable sources. Just because it isn't taking over your city/area does not mean it isn't widespread in other countries. hmwithτ 14:18, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The BBC, Euronews and CNN are trustworthy sources!--86.25.5.68 (talk) 10:56, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Where did you get 18,000 deaths? There are only 434 reported deaths according to the article at this moment in time. I can only assume that was a mistake which has since been altered -- m0tive (talk) 12:46, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

New World 2009 Flu Pandemic Map: idea

Hey, I was thinking if it isn't possible to create a map about this subject, which looks like the USA one

. It would be interesting, have the map made in this way João P. M. Lima (talk) 16:10, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

here is one, but only with the subdivisions

João P. M. Lima (talk) 16:16, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I can't find a map who as the divisions until the counties, but it would be nice, if the map was the one that I've posted before João P. M. Lima (talk) 16:21, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Makes sense to use provinces, states, regions or counties (or any first-level subdivisions at the national level) in SOME countries, but in most cases you'll end up with tiny pixel-sized dots. Still, this could be interesting for large countries such as Canada, India, Brazil, Russia, etc. 70.83.220.148 (talk) 17:18, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

It would be a good way of showing it's passage around the PRC, Argentina and USA over the passage of time as well as localising cases in the bigger countries like Russia, India, Brazil, etc!--86.25.8.152 (talk) 17:59, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I would like to see 2 world maps, 1 locating the number of victims per province and 1 locating the 1st case in each country and the provinces of the devistated nations like the USA, Argentina, China, UK and Canada. --86.25.8.152 (talk) 18:05, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

File:Spread of Swine Flu in Asia.svg File:Spread of Swine Flu in Europe.svg

Late April   Early May   Mid May   Late May   Early June   Mid June   Late June

Someone seems to have created such maps for Europe and Asia (date of first case) ... 76.66.193.20 (talk) 06:22, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

But if we use a map with just this

divisions, it would be better. In the actual map (that should continue existing independent of other maps been created), we see countries coloured with just one case, it's "good" to know, what countries has the flu, but is "even better" see, in a world scale, where the cases happened João P. M. Lima (talk) 09:46,

30 June 2009 (UTC)

The map of the U.S.A looks very informative here. Somebody should do it for the world, and keep updating it (it's a full time job). Julian (talk) 10:25, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

is that that I'm saying. It would be very interesting to have a world map with such information, it would be possible to See the focus in some parts of the world. But I search in commons a map like that, and it doesn't exist, the one more divided that I've found, is the one that I put in this page already (and I think that it isn't complete) João P. M. Lima (talk) 13:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Map

I've made a very quick map, using the one that I posted above, it's not very nice, better is really not nice, but i hope that someone improve it

BLACK: deaths; RED: confirmed cases; YELLOW: suspected cases

João P. M. Lima (talk) 14:29, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I think that we should have the map that we already have (only countries), we should have the map above (with the subdivisions), and finally, we should have the world map, like the US has for the divisions of the states João P. M. Lima (talk) 14:33, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

João, your map is excellent, It is just what we need!--86.25.4.217 (talk) 09:26, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

thanks, but it's still missing many parts of the world lol but, I would like to see too, a world map, with the subdivisions of a country (like the USA map) João P. M. Lima (talk) 10:37, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I think this should not be included on the article (which 86.25.4.217 has done) untill it is up-to-date. At a glance, I can see there are many confirmed cases from the other world map that haven't been included (ie. Africa, Middle East, Southern Asia, Central America). It's a really good idea and gives a far more realistic impression of the geographical spread of H1N1. How easy is it to get current data on all those areas? Hard I'd guess -- m0tive (talk) 11:17, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Also it really ought to be a .svg like the rest of the maps. Not only is this ideal for scaling it is almost essential if the map is to be updated easily by other people. The current map is just not good enough quality. |→ Spaully ^τ 11:25, 1 July 2009 (GMT)

in my computer i can't work with the wikipedia maps (i don't know why -.-'), but the map itself, is not complete, contries in Africa and in Central and South America aren't with their divisions (and the colors - red and yellow - can't be so "live") João P. M. Lima (talk) 14:10, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

i'll try to poste a new version of the map today, but i can't find all the information, to just color the rigth localizations João P. M. Lima (talk) 14:30, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

wiki maps (and alot of the graphics) are SVGs. You need a vector graphics program like Adobe Illustrator or Inkscape (which is free) to create/edit them. You can download Inkscape here. -- m0tive (talk) 14:42, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

ok, thanks i'm installing it, but how can we edit the black map to put the divisions of wich country (exist countries in this map, who have their divisions wrong, and many others neither have divisions) João P. M. Lima (talk) 14:54, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I can't posto a newer version, and I can't (i don't know) who to full the blank map with the divions of witch country João P. M. Lima (talk) 15:23, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I had to post a version apart, this is better that the first one, but still needs to be very improved

BLACK: deaths; RED: confirmed cases; YELLOW: suspected cases

Sorry to be picky, but that's still not an SVG - It is a lot better though, keep up the good work :) -- m0tive (talk) 17:16, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I can't color more regions, because there is no information in Wikipedia about it, and the ones that exist (like all the american continent), doesn't have their divisions on the map, that's way I'm asking for help, to complete the map (correcting and ading the regions to all the countries, and after to color it).

By the way, I searched to see the municiples of wich country (like the map of USA), and I think that would be very interesting to have a world map with all that information, it will create a very good visual way to see the parts of the world were the pandemic is seriously João P. M. Lima (talk) 17:55, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Here in this web page (PAHO) you can find more information about each state/province, department etc for the Americas [19]), and think there is another version for the other regions --Vrysxy! (talk) 08:50, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

I've found this map:

World administrative divisions

It has all the divisions of all countries in the world, and in most of them, there are the subdivisions too João P. M. Lima (talk) 18:01, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

It's missing Alaska, part of the Pacific, part of Russia, and most of Yukon. Plus it has Antarctica divided, which it should not. It appears to be a second-level national subdivision map? 70.29.208.69 (talk) 21:36, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

You map is truly awesome and authoritative, sir! It has good visualization to--86.25.6.92 (talk) 19:17, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

this map is only a second-level national subdivision map, cause it only appers the areas down of the states (i don't know how to call in english, so i use the US as an example). I found it in the article about the divisions of countries. I know that it misses some parts, but I hope someone create or improve an existing map until this defenition (sub-subdivisions). João P. M. Lima (talk) 22:22, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

First cases of tamiflu resistance

Is it worth mentioning in the article? So far, it has only been reported in a patient in Denmark. It looks like tamiflu is still effective everywhere else, but this new resistant strain could propagate. Excerpt: «Roche Holding AG confirmed a patient with H1N1 influenza in Denmark showed resistance to the antiviral drug. David Reddy, company executive, said it was not unexpected given that common seasonal flu could do the same.» http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8124987.stm 70.83.220.148 (talk) 17:16, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Good Googling, I think it is well worth mentioning!--86.25.8.152 (talk) 17:52, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Should not go in article. It is a single isolated case that is not expected to spread, nor does it indicate that the pandemic strain can easily evolve such resistance. The patient was taking a low dose of tamiflu prior to getting sick because someone in her household had the flu. WAS 4.250 (talk) 18:20, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

It is already mentioned in the "Timeline" article. 70.83.220.148 (talk) 18:56, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

So? WAS 4.250 (talk) 19:03, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

If it is worth mentioning in the Timeline article, then maybe it should be mentioned here. By the way... are you in charge of moderation in this article, or what? 70.83.220.148 (talk) 19:09, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Just a note, no-one owns or is "in charge of moderation" of any article. User:WAS 4.250 is just a very active contributor to this article and knows what he/she is talking about. Jozal ^(talk) 20:01, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Patient resistant to tamiflu (oseltamivir)? Let's be precise and articulate, please. Tamiflu is not a disease (no resistance to it), so it may just not work as a cure for someone. It may not work because of the patient (for some reason, we need an expert here), or the virus developed a resistant strain (that's another thing). That thing is very scary, even though feared by many experts. Yes, it's a very important information (it should be on the page in the right way), because if we have a resistant strain to tamiflu, we could have the worst flu in the history of the world. Anyway, it's very serious. Julian (talk) 00:37, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I thought you were talking about the resistance of tamiflu in Argentina, but it seems that it also happening in Denmark, here is the article saying that the virus has gained some resistance to Tamiflu and elderly people are getting infected as much as young people too. Is in Spanish, sorry [20]. --Vrysxy! (talk) 01:26, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

What? Tamiflu isn't even named in that article. And yes, I speak spanish. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.31.1.210 (talk) 05:56, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Bosnia, Brazil, and Maps

Somebody caught the bug in Bosnia, allegedly, the first case there, maybe. In Brazil, somebody died, but until it was official, with the appropriate link to the reference the number of dead was 0(1). That's the way to do it. Congrats!

For cases in Bosnia we have 1, even though the reference doesn't seem to be a credible source of information, and it even says that further testing follows. At best, we should have 0(1) for Bosnia, because it's clear that nobody knows for sure, yet.

It Happened with Croatia few weeks ago. Yes, the minister of health stated it, but an hour later, the lab in London, said they made a mistake. Then somebody for no good reason reported cases in Croatia again. All in all, we had misinformation here for about 5 days.

If the Bosnian case proves to be real, we'd have a very wrong map. Croatia marked as having the flu cases, and Bosnia as free of them. However, it wouldn't really matter, because countries with thousands cases are marked the same as countries with one, or none.

I suggest coloring maps differently. There is a difference between 1 and 100, and between 100 and 1,000. Now we have a country with over 10,000. They should definitely be marked differently. There are ways to improve these pages (hope I'm helping).

Still, Wikipedia is the best source for the pig flu information on the Net. My hat down, to all of you. Wonderful work!

Julian (talk) 00:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that's what i was thinking, since im the one updating most maps, i think it's time to change the way of coloring the maps, what if we start using another parameter? Like light pink for 1+ 50, pink for 100+, red for 500+, dark red for 5000+, dark dark red for 30,000+? --Vrysxy! (talk) 03:45, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

How about using different shades of red for the number of cases, and different shades of gray for countries with fatal outcomes (that could make it easier for Vrysxy, too -- maps would stay/seem accurate for a longer time, and easier to read). There is a great map of the U.S.A proposed on this page with a good coloring scheme (it may be just difficult to maintain it). Julian (talk) 09:43, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

You mean like a hybrid map? Gray for deads? I think it's time to using different shades of red, i saw one example with light pink then pink and even violet then red to dark red in the Australian talk page, but then we will have to change the parameters to the "million" if the flu gets worst. Right now i think is not the best option to have a color for a million cases, because 1 to 5 is to close, and sometimes a country can inform of 10 or more than 100 cases in just one day, so i think the current parameter of 1+ and 5+ should change to another parameter. Any ideas? because then we have to change those colors to all the articles, because i did that change by myself when i changed the color of the US/Mexican/Canadian maps. I think i will need more help --Vrysxy! (talk) 18:52, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Someone already made a hybrid map... but I don't know what the colors represent, they don't seem to match my conception of what they mean. File:H1N1 map by total cases.svg

70.29.208.69 (talk) 04:34, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Some good maps around use differently sized circles to indicate the deaths on top of colour for the cases. This seems to work well, though causes problems with very small nations. Having a combined map is appealing if possible, but may be tricky to make legible.

As for scale, what about 1,100,1000,10000,100000? Or perhaps 50,000 for the top option until 100,000 becomes useful. I'm tempted to try to use powers of ten, good from the logarithmic point of view. In the long run it would be great to get a spectrum of colours used based on the actual figure and some equation to calculate the colour value, though the time involved in that would require a stable situation. |→ Spaully ^τ 21:57, 30 June 2009 (GMT)

Yeah that would be better, but who's going to help me with all the updates? I wil need someone to update all the information here on the English Wikipedia, and i will update the numbers in the Spanish Wikipedia, and others Wikipedia can update it late it, they're not up to date anyway like the Spanish and English Wikipedia. --Vrysxy! (talk) 08:56, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Actual impact of the disease

For example, there can be a country with dozens of cases reported a month ago. There may have been people who died of the disease (it's all hypothetical), but nobody is ill there at the moment. The illness could be history there (hopefully).

Anyway, we do hope that this flu will be contained eventually (normal people should). It would be good to think how to report that, too (instead of going to report it in thousands of cases). There already are countries with no virulent people (listed as countries with cases).

At the time we just report how the disease is spreading (like nobody survived it), but most of the reported cases are no longer ill. They are immune too. In some countries with number of cases listed, nobody died, and nobody has the disease any more.

It would be nice to have the information about how many people are actually ill at the time, how this flu is spreading, and dying out. Let's try to be positive, and informative!

Julian (talk) 02:33, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Reliable sources

Trust ones like this one- [21]! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.25.2.113 (talk) 10:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

BiH doesn't have a confirmed case, but suspect. Please fix a list of countries with confirmed infections and put BiH in list of countries that have got suspected case. Results of detailed analysis will be come tomorrow.--Vatrena ptica (talk) 13:49, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

mh, its not yet official.24.132.171.225 (talk) 19:21, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Mutation potential

If someone thinks this is worthy of including:

http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=1145616&pid=6781545&toi=6256

The link is in spanish and mentions that the virus might have suffered a mutation and that's the cause for the sharp rise in deaths in Argentina (42 in 15 days).

This is mentioned in the 4th paragraph:

Pero hay un dato que tiene preocupados a los epidemiólogos respecto de la evolución de la gripe A: el virus habría sufrido variaciones o mutaciones en la Argentina y ésa sería la causa de un mayor número de cuadros médicos "entre moderados y graves", que provocaron muertes fulminantes de personas sanas e internaciones prolongadas.

"But there's something that makes epidemiologists concerned about the evolution of the flu: the virus would suffered mutations or variations in Argentina, and that's the cause for a greater number of moderate or worse cases, that provoke fulminating deaths in healthy people and prolonged hospitalizations"

and sixth:

Las posibles variaciones del virus que se estudian en el Instituto Malbrán comenzaron a notarse en las últimas dos semanas y es uno de los factores más temidos por la Organización Mundial de la Salud (OMS). La mutación explicaría que el número de fallecimientos supere al registrado en países vecinos también afectados, como Chile, donde murieron 14 pacientes.

"Possible mutations of the virus that are being studied in the Malbrán Institute started being noticed in the last too weeks and is one of the most feared possibilities by the WHO. It would explain the number of deaths being greater than in neighbor contries such as Chile, where 14 people have died"

It is just mentioned, there is no confirmation, but I think it's worth noting, and keeping an eye on for future developments.

190.17.193.5 (talk) 05:50, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

lanacion.com is a biased paper against the Argentinean Government, not a reliable source.

community outbreak maps

• 
  H1N1 map by confirmed community outbreaks.svg
• 
  H1N1 South America Community Outbreaks.svg
• 
  H1N1 Europe Community Outbreaks.svg
• 
  H1N1 Asia Community Outbreaks.svg

Can the various community outbreak maps have their colours harmonized?

How about additing in all countries with confirmed infections, and adding a second color for "isolated infections" ?

76.66.193.20 (talk) 06:06, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Switzerland

• 
  H1N1 Switzerland Map.svg
  non-English Wikipedia
• H1N1 Switzerland Map-2.svg
  H1N1 Switzerland Map-2.svg
• H1N1 Switzerland Map-3.svg English Wikipedia
  H1N1 Switzerland Map-3.svg
  English Wikipedia

There seems to be a profusion of Switzerland maps being made, instead of having the original being updated... this has already lead to the fragmentation of what map is used in various different Wikipedias...

76.66.193.20 (talk) 06:32, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Swine flu parties

This was previously discussed with no decision on inclusion at Talk:2009 flu pandemic/Archive 6#Swine flu parties. Coverage in reliable sources continues to grow. The concept is to catch the flu now and have some protection if a more severe version comes around in the next flu season. Before vaccines, there were chickenpox parties. "Swine flu parties" are a bad idea, per experts, but there have been articles about them in several countries in major newspapers and news channels, per Google news search [22], [23]. These include the New York Times, the BBC, the Independent, the Telegraph, the Sun, Daily Mail and Irish Times. The idea is especially popular among parents who oppose vaccination [24]., Would it now be appropriate to add a section on them, including authoritative advice that it is a bad idea [25], [26]? We are not giving them the idea of "putting beans up their noses," since they are already doing it in many places, per the above cites. Wikipedia already has the article Pox party, which says it may be illegal in the U.S. to knowingly expose your children to disease germs. That article does not mention swine flu. Edison (talk) 22:41, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

If it is notable enough we include it. Otherwise not. Do you have a source saying it is significant? I lean towards having a sentence or two but not more on it in this article. Another approach is to create a separate article we can reference in "see also". Over 50 years ago my mother got me and my siblings deliberately ill with a common childhood illness that had no vaccine at that time... WAS 4.250 (talk) 08:22, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I was exposed to diseases as a child too. It was a common procedure, because if you caught those diseases later, lake rubeola (measles), they were more dangerous. Today, they vaccinate infants against rubeola, but I don't know about all such diseases. The flu has never been on the list of diseases good to be infected with as a child (even though, I had it once, as a child, and never again). Listening to experts is probably the best, even though many experts suggested lobotomy half a century ago for some mental problems. Experts today disagree... Julian (talk) 04:23, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

"Treatment Phase"

Ministers now say that ""Cases are doubling every week and on this trend we could see over 100,000 cases per day by the end of August." I'm just wondering if this could be incorperated into the artice. Noir Q (talk) 16:59, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

"Ministers say?" Ministers of what? Some church? Health department? Agriculture? Do they all say it? Or just some? Please be precise... Now, I see it's something local, they can't contain it in UK, and they know who ministers are (the rest of us don't). The question is: "How fragile national health related systems around the world are? They seem to lose control after just a thousand cases or so, even highly developed countries like U.S.A or UK. Julian (talk) 04:38, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

That is an estimate of the number of cases Britain will have per day in August 2009. We need an estimate for the world. So far there is no such estimate. It is a shame so may people misunderstand the nature of the "confirmed laboratory cases" numbers. WAS 4.250 (talk) 05:33, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

The change in UK policy has been noted on 2009 flu pandemic in the United Kingdom (Talk Page), and any information about the estimated number of cases should be on that page. Though an important development in the UK, this is not significantly important when looking at the global development of swine flu -- m0tive (talk) 08:58, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

File:H1N1 South America Map.svg

• 
  File:H1N1 South America Map.svg
• 
  File:H1N1 North America Map.svg

File:H1N1 South America Map.svg is closing on being completely black, can someone convert this to first level national subdivisions mapping, like the North America map? 70.29.208.69 (talk) 05:15, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

A year from now, every country in the world will have at least one death from the 2009 flu pandemic virus. This is an encyclopedia, not a newspaper. I can't imagine what people are thinking who are trying to update confirmed deaths and cases every damn day. WAS 4.250 (talk) 05:38, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah i agree, with North america is enough, because we have more information about Canada, the USA and Mexico, i know there is information on the PAHO webpage about each death in each country in the Americas, but that would be tough to try to update everyday when someone died, right now i got bored when i update the North America map, then i have to update the Mexican, US and Canadian map, so i dont have time to do another map for South America. --Vrysxy! (talk) 09:01, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Argentina Update

The ministry of Health confirmed the 100.000 cases its on every single newspaper and tv station —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.255.215.124 (talk) 21:43, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

100,000+ cases. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.210.16.61 (talk) 15:13, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Should show only LABORATORY CONFIRMED cases for Argentina. Not estimated cases. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.45.35.49 (talk) 16:04, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that's right, but I think we can put it somewhere in the article, of course not in the table, but like a marginal data, soon to be confirmed, and that because the media coverage of the 100,000 swine Argetinians —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.234.19.65 (talk) 18:34, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

100,000 sick in a nation of 40 million? China only has 2,000 sick in a land of 1.1 billion!--86.25.14.16 (talk) 19:09, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

And the United States has 1 million with a population of 300. What is the problem?? --201.255.189.27 (talk) 08:17, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Argentina has only had 26 dead and 1,500 sick [27]! --86.25.6.241 (talk) 19:14, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

69 deaths not 26. --Vrysxy! (talk) 03:08, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

New Zealand first 3 deaths

Three die in New Zealand.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/07/04/2616871.htm

Lachy123 (talk) 07:55, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

World update

World reaction including Gabon banning pork imports amongst others [[28]]. Mexico is lifting restrictions as the USA fall ill on mass [[29]] / [[30]]! The USA and China fall ill on mass [[31]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

The UK

A Geordie is ill [[32]] / [[33]] and a Londoner dies [[34]]. A help line and advice [[35]] / [[36]] / [[37]] / [[38]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Australia

A Aborigine guy is dead now [[39]]! --86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Canada

The Inuit are riddled with it [[40]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Bhutan

Bhutan is still flu free [[41]]--86.25.6.92 (talk) 19:14, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Tonga

Tonga prepares for the worst [[42]]--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC) !

Croatia update 2

Croatia has now got it [[43]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Sudan update 2

Sudan has 3 cases now [[44]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Palau

Palau strikes back after getting it’s 1st victim [[45]] / [[46]]!--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:59, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Palestine

Palestine has 30 victims [Bank Gaza Strip]!--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Israel

Israel has 577 victims [[47]]!--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Netherlands Antilles

Aruba has 3 cases [[48]]. Sint Maarten has 7 infected citizens [Maarten]. Curaçao has 8 cases [[49]]. Martinique has 2 victims [[50]]. The territories have total of 20 victims as a whole.--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Free Iraq

Our friends in Iraq have 11 cases of swine flu [[51]].--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Bosnia

Bosnia has 1 case [and Hezegovina]. --86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:59, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

PNG

PNG has 1 infected person [New Guinea]. --86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:59, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico has 18 ill [Rico]! --86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

The Virgin Islands

The US virgin Is has 1 case [Islands] and the British Virgin islands 2 sick as well [Virgin Islands]! The total for the islands as a whole stands at only 3.--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

French Polynesia

The remote and distant French colony of French Polynesia has 2 cases [Polynesia]!

Panama

Panama has 417 infected people [[52]].--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Guatemala

245 Guatemalans are ill [[53]] and 2 are dead [[54]].--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

The USA

California has 1985 [[55]] victims and 21 dead [[56]]! Iowa has 92 sick [[57]] , but luckily no [[58]] dead!--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

China update

China's death is not caused by swine flu but by electricity[leakage.http://inews.mingpao.com/htm/INews/20090703/aa51216k.htm] Sampsonkwan (talk) 10:24, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Niue

NZ and the tine attol of Niue are screening people that fly between the 2 nations on the once weekly flight [[59]]. --86.25.6.92 (talk) 19:54, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Great web site

Here is my awesome new source [[60]]!!! --86.25.6.92 (talk) 19:00, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Ignore this hoax!

Warning, a spammer is issuing this [[61]]!!!--86.25.6.92 (talk) 18:56, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

A possible media over-reaction

The press are over reacting again, as with SARS [[62]]!--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

A UK vaccine cometh!

A vaccine is coming very soon now [[63]]!

--86.25.10.98 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Travel alerts for China

The section "Travel alerts for China" has a very US-POV. 70.29.208.69 (talk) 06:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Testing in the UK

This section is inaccurate:

• As late as July 4, 2009, Britain still refused to do widespread testing for swine flu, "slowing the World Health Organization's efforts to declare that the viral spread had become a pandemic". Britain's Health Minister Andy Burnham belatedly acknowledged Thursday (July 2, 2009) that Britain needs to revamp its response and could see up to 100,000 new swine flu cases a day by the end of August [31].

The UK Health Protection Agency has been testing since April [64]. The source given, does not say that "as late as July 4, 2009, Britain still refused.." it says "Britain, for its part, had refused to do widespread testing for swine flu, slowing the World Health Organization's efforts to declare that the viral spread had become a pandemic," which is not true and I don't think the source used is reliable. Actually, the UK is going to stop testing now and will allow family doctors to make the diagnosis based on symptoms and not laboratory tests. [65]. The article gives the impression that the UK has been slow to act, it has not. But the UK has failed to contain the spread of infection despite widespread testing. Graham Colm ^Talk 08:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:Sofixit WAS 4.250 (talk) 09:09, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I have. Graham Colm ^Talk 09:12, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

First cases of tamiflu resistance

Is it worth mentioning in the article? So far, it has only been reported in a patient in Denmark. It looks like tamiflu is still effective everywhere else, but this new resistant strain could propagate. Excerpt: «Roche Holding AG confirmed a patient with H1N1 influenza in Denmark showed resistance to the antiviral drug. David Reddy, company executive, said it was not unexpected given that common seasonal flu could do the same. [[66]] I think it is well worth mentioning!It is a single isolated case that already mentioned in the "Timeline" article. If it is worth mentioning in the Timeline article, then maybe it should be mentioned here. Reoprts are also saying about the resistance of tamiflu in Argentina, but it seems that it also happening in Denmark, here is the article saying that the virus has gained some resistance to Tamiflu and elderly people are getting infected as much as young people too. [67]. --86.25.11.150 (talk) 14:42, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

There has been not only the case in Denmark, but also a case in Japan and one in Hongkong [68][69] | FHessel (talk) 16:26, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

"Treatment Phase"

Ministers now say that ""Cases are doubling every week and on this trend we could see over 100,000 cases per day by the end of August." I'm just wondering if this could be incorperated into the artice. --86.25.11.150 (talk) 14:52, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

REPLY OF Pandemic table move

I STRONLY DISAGREE ABT THE MOVING OF THE PANDAMIC TABLE. SINCE THE FLU IS SPREADING WIDLY AND THE DATA IS STILL UPDATING DAILY OF DIFFERENT COUNTRIES IF THE TABLE MOVE DOWNWARD, THE PEOPLE CANNOT KNOW THE LATEST UPDATE OF THE CASES ABT THE FLU. THE CASES NUMBER IS THE MOST IMPORTANT AND THE ONLY VARIABLE DATA OF THE FLU, WHY DON'T YOU MOVE BACK THE TABLE TO THE TOP OF THE PAGE? BESIDES,LOTS OF PPL MAY GET INCONVENIENT TO CHECK THE TABLE ON THE PHONE. THEREFORE, I HOPE THAT THE TABLE CAN MOVE BACK TO THE TOP AND BEING MORE CONVENIENT TO THE READER AROUND THE WORLD...THANKS --113.252.250.224 (talk) 12:08, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Firstly the placement of the table at the top of the article is in violation of wikipedia policy WP:UNDUE. Without qualifications to explain that the table does not consist of estimates for infections/deaths most users will incorrectly assume that the infection figures can be used to estimate the numbers infected in a given country. Certainly many people assume that the total death figure is an estimate for the number of people to have died from this pandemic so far. In reality there are reasons to think the total value may be much higher (see the section entitled data reporting and accuracy).

Secondly to view the table on your phone you may be better off visiting Template:2009 flu pandemic table‎.

Thirdly could you please avoid using all capitals in your messages if possible. Online it is thought of as shouting and is considered to be rude. Barnaby dawson (talk) 12:17, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry about the poor attitude. I only wanted to know the reason about moving the table.At last,thanks for your compromise of the different opinion on the page....--113.252.250.224 (talk) 12:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

NPOV

The placement of the pandemic information table at the top of this article violates WP:UNDUE (part of NPOV) in that it gives undue prominence to a viewpoint.

The table is interpreted by most as giving estimates of deaths. For balance the article must give equal prominence to the fact that historically influenza surveilance of deaths have given figures that, if treated as estimates, would be gross underestimates. Wherever the table appears in this article this information must also appear because those people who read the table are unlikely to read any qualifying material unless associated with the table and that qualifying material would not be associated with the table if placed elsewhere.

One way in which this NPOV issue could be resolved would be to associate the first paragraph from the section 'data reporting and accuracy' with the table. Barnaby dawson (talk) 16:49, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Ummm right..... why dont you just do that and remove the tag since thats the only reason its there...? Bretonnia (talk) 17:29, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

This really isn't a NPOV issue, all you seem to be saying is that people need to be aware of the limitations of the available data. Well, yes, that is quite true. However, almost all the reliable sources that discuss the topic present this data, so per WP:UNDUE that is what we also have to do. I don't think this tag is at all justified. Tim Vickers (talk) 17:59, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I have attempted to resolve this NPOV issue myself (as has WAS 4.250) in more than one way. However, many editors disagreed with our attempts to resolve it. However, this is still an NPOV issue. The issue matters because this figure matters. Misunderstand this figure and you misunderstand this pandemic (this is also true of the infections figure). Declaring the NPOV problem opens up the floor to clever suggestions for resolving it (which I regrettably have been unable to find so far). Barnaby dawson (talk) 18:37, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

What does the table say? There are x confirmed cases and x confirmed deaths. Is this a fact or a viewpoint? You can prove me wrong, but I'd say it is a fact, referenced by good sources. So, where does the problem come from? It arises, because you assert, that "the table is interpreted by most as ...". This is a point of view. I don't know, whether you have spoken with 'most' or where you have got this information from. I, for my part appreciate the wikipedia users as people, who are well able to read, that it says 'confirmed cases' in the header and to understand, that the numbers are 'confirmed cases' and not 'infection cases'.

I would also prefer to be able to present 'infection cases' instead of 'confirmed cases', but, despite an occasional estimation, which is out of date pretty soon again (see for example, what happened to the statements of infections in Mexico and New York, they have been stated there even weeks after their publication), there are no data we could report. I could happily live with a third column, labeled 'latest estimation of true extent', but we would need another column giving the 'date of estimation' because numbers double within days.

So I come to the conclusion, there is no alternative to these data. What is better for the readers? No data or data with limitations? Guess yourself.

What about: Let's place a caveat right under the table, which refers to the data accuracy section? And in the data accuracy section it should be said clearly, that the US confirmed deaths of the table relate to the 1,812 flu deaths of 2005 in comparison and not to the 36.000 which are widely used. (By the way, this is a strong bias on side of the CDC: they are promoting the 36.000 on the one hand, but on the other hand they are acting very rigidly when it comes to the question, whether the pandemic flu has been the cause of the death)

I think, that we are dealing with a highly sensible topic here. The wikipedia reader deserve, that we present them the best information we have. That is on one side all the critical considerations on data quality. On the other side it is the best possible overview over the world's status and that is (unfortunately) only to be found in these numbers.

I am holding, that the undue weight argument does not apply here. I vote for leaving the table where it is, yet strengthening the link to the data accuracy section.

When the pandemic is over this table has to be overworked completely and placed somewhere else, but let's first things get done first. | FHessel (talk) 18:14, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I have not been suggesting deleting this table (at least since the deletion nomination was rejected). No-one I know who has seen that table has realised that reported deaths are not an estimate of actual deaths and most of those are trained scientists or mathematicians. In my opinion estimation issue is counter intuitive but true.

A caveat is a good idea if you can get one to stick without it being deleted for aesthetic reasons. We had one earlier and it disapeared. We might also include a few well chosen sentences from the data accuracy section in the introduction.

Lets here if there are any other other suggestions before doing anything. Barnaby dawson (talk) 18:37, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I've edited the caption of the table, it now states "Confirmed cases are a small fraction of the total number of cases." Tim Vickers (talk) 18:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for trying TimVickers. I'm afraid that is likely to be deleted on the basis that it isn't sourced (which is fair enough). Right now the only sources I know of talk about flu surveilance in general (which we can use until there's a more relevant source I think). For a caveat in the table we need a sourced statement and one that doesn't just talk about infections or just talk about deaths (for balance). We probably need more than this statement though. Might be better to include a few sourced lines in the introduction instead. Barnaby dawson (talk) 20:26, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I've added a source and reworded the caption to paraphrase the wording in the discussion of the cited paper. Tim Vickers (talk) 20:32, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I've added a CDC statement regarding death figures. These two should do the trick (as best we can). If they remain there tomorrow I'll withdraw my NPOV template. Barnaby dawson (talk) 20:54, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I've merged the two comments together, I don't see anybody disputing these sources or the relevance of this information to the table so I'll remove the POV tag now, as the issue seems to have been resolved. Tim Vickers (talk) 21:07, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

The fact that the table CLEARLY says "confirmed cases" and "confirmed deaths" means that it clearly states what it is. You can not make an argument from "people will assume". What is your evidence? And where is your evidence that if we moved it, people would assume less? The table already makes it clear what it is reporting, in as simple and straightforward terms as it can. The fact of the matter is people who want to understand limits to confirmatin will go down and read about it, and people who just want some basic numbers with whatever reliability they have, will not, and no amount of messing around with the table will really change that, it will just inconvenience a lot of people who come here to see the latest updates of the table.Johnpacklambert (talk) 20:19, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I am just trying to raise the quality of this article Johnpacklambert. Some comments require clarification because most people misunderstand them. This is one such case. This isn't an ordinary article where such issues wouldn't matter and it isn't a trivial figure that isn't really relevant to the article. Its one of the most important figures in one of the most important articles on wikipedia. It matters if people do not understand it and believe me few people do. Barnaby dawson (talk) 20:43, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

2+ UK deaths

Two more people have also died here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/8137115.stm

Please update the UK section.

(86.170.162.197 (talk) 16:57, 6 July 2009 (UTC))

Vaccines and mutations

If the strain mutates and becomes more virulent, how likely is it that it will also mutate in a way that will considerably diminish the protection given by vaccination? Is it possible to estimate such a thing? Has someone made an estimate? Samulili (talk) 18:17, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

This happens by genetic drift, and is not a rapid process as multiple parts of the hemagglutinin protein are recognised by antibodies, so multiple mutations are needed. In contrast, just one or two mutations can prevent binding of a drug to the neuraminidase active site since the drug binds to a single part of the protein. People have tried to predict the rate of drift, but I don't think this has been done with any accuracy yet. Tim Vickers (talk) 18:35, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Pandemic table move

I just want to express my support for the moving of the pandemic table to the data reporting and accuracy section. The table really needs to be put in context so that the reader can understand that the figures it contains cannot be used as estimates. This move is a good way of doing this. Barnaby dawson (talk) 09:30, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The numbers are now meaningless according to reliable sources for any location where it is widespread (US, Britain, etc) Soon it will be widespread everywhere. If we can't move it to where it belongs, then it must be deleted as violating wikipedia policy which states "Undue weight applies to more than just viewpoints. Just as giving undue weight to a viewpoint is not neutral, so is giving undue weight to other verifiable and sourced statements. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements." WAS 4.250 (talk) 12:55, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree it should be moved to the data section, the numbers are now pretty useless out of context. Undue weight does not justify deleting it completely when the problem can be rectified by a move to a different section. |→ Spaully ^τ 14:16, 5 July 2009 (GMT)

I strongly disagree. The table shows confirmd cases and confirmed deaths. There are no other world wide comparable data available on this pandemic and - at least the confirmed deaths - should be meaningful data. Every other statement on infection numbers is a pure estimation based on what? And these statements are varying depending on the end the issuer pursues. The wikipedia policy is not violated here, since the table is based on the majoritie's statements (or do you want to claim, that public healt agencies and the WHO are minorities?). Furthermore the table is displaying confirmed cases (not infection numbers!!!), and I cannot see a competing statement on the CONFIRMED cases anywhere. Finally I want to remind Barnaby dawson, that he has proposed the table for deletion recently and he was overruled. So please wait for a template talk consensus, before moving or deleting the table. | FHessel (talk) 14:37, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Read the section "Data reporting and accuracy". WAS 4.250 (talk) 07:29, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

It is not against wikipedia policy to nominate an article for deletion. Neither does my unsucessfully nominating an article for deletion have any relevance to the current discussion. Barnaby dawson (talk) 11:16, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Talking about consensus, I re-added the template after WAS 2.450 removed it from the article. Move it back to the original location if you want, I've not got the time to discuss this in depth. |→ Spaully ^τ 17:10, 5 July 2009 (GMT)

The main article states that this is a current pandemic. I think that the table reflects the 'currentness' of the situation, and therefore agree that it should remain in place until this pandemic becomes history. As all numbers in the table are referenced, most with MOH data from the country involved, I can't see a problem with the validity of the data. --Dionliddell (talk) 07:33, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem with the validity of the data is spelled out at the section "Data reporting and accuracy". As per wikipedia policy, the table should be in that section or not in the article at all. WAS 4.250 (talk) 07:42, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm thinking that the wording of that clause appears to be open to interpretation. And would probably be taken with 'a grain of salt' in an article that self proclaims that it is a current event. For arguments sake, I would put it to you that a table with current numbers contains a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. The subject in this case being a current pandemic.--Dionliddell (talk) 07:52, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

(<---) What do you think the numbers represent? They do not represent the best reliable sources' estimates for actual cases or actual deaths. It is too costly to laboratory verify every case once it starts spreading so at that point (right now) the best estimates are obtained by scientific sampling. Read the section "Data reporting and accuracy". WAS 4.250 (talk) 08:55, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

The numbers do not claim to be 'actual cases', only confirmed cases. And confirmed deaths - which should be identical with actual deaths. Everybody knows, that in case of an outbreak, there is no capacity and no material to test all the ill people, besides, there are many, who never show up at a doctor's (which is, by the way, a limitation of accuracy, which also the flu surveillance systems cannot overcome). According to scientists, the only way to discover the true extent of an epidemic outbreak, is to test a statistical sample of the poulation on antigenes after the outbreak is over. But now we are in the midst of an outbreak. And the best information, we can give, is the information we are presenting here. We need information, which is available for all countries (which unfortunately excludes flu surveillance systems, only a few countries do have such systems), and which is being updated regularly. Any interested person can get valuable insights from following the changes of the confirmed cases, such as where the current hot-spots are. Guessing the true number of infections is a game of chance, which is always connected with a political aim (e.g. the higher the number of infections is being estimated, the lower the case-fatality rate appears) and should therefore be treated with a lot of cautiousness. Regarding the confirmed cases there is at least a minimum of comparability given by the WHO guidelines. | FHessel (talk) 09:27, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

The confirmed deaths are most certainly not identical with actual deaths, indeed its not even close (read the data accuracy section to see why). The fact that you thought it was is ample reason to move this table to somewhere where the caveats can be properly explained. Note that the CDC says that "...influenza is infrequently listed on death certificates of people who die from flu-related complications." and furthermore that "Only counting deaths where influenza was included on a death certificate would be a gross underestimation of influenza’s true impact.". Barnaby dawson (talk) 10:11, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I would say that numbers quoted from health authorities from their respective countries do indeed represent reliable sources. The sources which are in turn utilised by the WHO and ECDC to produce numbers which are also relayed on said table but in a delayed format. I agree that constant random sampling of multiple populations with appropriate follow up to determine mortality rates would be the way to go. But that too would be too costly for many countries. What we do have in our table is a best effort from wikipedia community members at updating an article that is flagged as a current event (pandemic). I would hate to see a table that has had so much work put into it by so many people removed or demoted on a whim. I should also quote from the wikipedia scriptures in this case: Policies need to be approached with common sense; adhere to the spirit rather than the letter of the rules, and be prepared to ignore the rules on the rare occasions when they conflict with the goal of improving the encyclopedia --Dionliddell (talk) 09:22, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There are reliable sources for these figures. But these figures are not estimates of either the infections or the death toll and that is not made clear in the introduction (and most people won't really understand what laboratory confirmed means here either). It is made clear in the data accuracy section the problems with using these numbers as estimates. Surely its common sense not to present figures that many (see above) will misunderstand without explaining them properly. We cannot do that at the top of the article as there is other material that needs to go there. We can do it in the data reporting and accuracy section. Really letting this misleading information appear at the top of the article without equal prominence to caveats is not NPOV. Barnaby dawson (talk) 10:11, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

The numbers are being reported by health authorities including the WHO. I do not notice any hand wringing from the WHO when publishing these numbers within their own website. Perhaps the introduction needs modification to help those that may be mislead. But the table needs to remain in its pride of place - at the top of this current event article. There are 'general purpose' (non current event) articles dedicated to influenza pandemics and Swine Influenza, and I would agree in those cases that a dynamic table such as this has no place in those particular pages. --Dionliddell (talk) 10:51, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There is no room for the necessary caveats to this table in the introduction and without them it is very misleading. The WHO figures are intended for use by health care bodies that understand the difference between flu surveilance data and estimates. That they are misunderstood by the media is not an excuse for us to present them to the general public in a misleading manner. Barnaby dawson (talk) 11:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I cannot find any references claiming that the WHO (or figures from various MoHs) are for health care bodies only. If they are really for health care professionals only, why they don't put these figures on PubMed? We are only here to present the views, both from the MoHs and the media. If they really manipulate the data, I believe in the long run there would be other reports pinpointing their misleading acts out. We cannot simply judge if these figures are misleading or not. So the table should remain there to show the current-ness of the pandemic and leave the interpretation to our readers. - Xavier Fung (talk) 12:19, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There are credible sources explaining this aspect of influenza surveilance. See the following material from the data reporting and accuracy section: Barnaby dawson (talk) 12:57, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Influenza surveillance information "answers the questions of where, when, and what influenza viruses are circulating. It can be used to determine if influenza activity is increasing or decreasing, but cannot be used to ascertain how many people have become ill with influenza". For example, as of late June 2009 influenza surveillance information showed the U.S. had nearly 28,000 laboratory confirmed cases including 3,065 hospitalizations and 127 deaths; but mathematical modeling showed an estimated 1 million Americans currently had the 2009 pandemic flu according to Lyn Finelli, a flu surveillance official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.. Estimating deaths from influenza is also a complicated process. In 2005 influenza only appeared on the death certificates of 1,812 people (USA only). The average annual toll from flu is, however, estimated to be 36,000 (USA only). The CDC explains that "...influenza is infrequently listed on death certificates of people who die from flu-related complications." and furthermore that "Only counting deaths where influenza was included on a death certificate would be a gross underestimation of influenza’s true impact.".

I strongly dissagree. This table plays a very important role in this article. It reflects the current situation of the pandemic! We shouldn't remove it!Sampsonkwan (talk) 09:50, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Stop edit warring. WAS 4.250 has already broken the 3 revert rule ([70][71][72][73]) and others are getting close. There is no consensus at all at present so leave it as it was and discuss. 82.28.130.10 (talk) 09:52, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

REPLY OF Pandemic table move I STRONLY DISAGREE ABT THE MOVING OF THE PANDAMIC TABLE. SINCE THE FLU IS SPREADING WIDLY AND THE DATA IS STILL UPDATING DAILY OF DIFFERENT COUNTRIES IF THE TABLE MOVE DOWNWARD, THE PEOPLE CANNOT KNOW THE LATEST UPDATE OF THE CASES ABT THE FLU. THE CASES NUMBER IS THE MOST IMPORTANT AND THE ONLY VARIABLE DATA OF THE FLU, WHY DON'T YOU MOVE BACK THE TABLE TO THE TOP OF THE PAGE? BESIDES,LOTS OF PPL MAY GET INCONVENIENT TO CHECK THE TABLE ON THE PHONE. THEREFORE, I HOPE THAT THE TABLE CAN MOVE BACK TO THE TOP AND BEING MORE CONVENIENT TO THE READER AROUND THE WORLD...THANKS —Preceding unsigned comment added by 113.252.250.224 (talk) 12:05, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I also strongly disagree, the table is the most important element for the majority of people accessing this page and it has been quite happy at the top right since the outbreak began. Editors need to be very careful that by wrapping things up in red tape and getting the category right they don't make information LESS accessible by the real users of wikipedia rather than more accessible. There is no point in getting the categorisation of a table right, putting it in the right pigeon hole if that makes the data harder to access.--Hontogaichiban (talk) 13:41, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

As with many others I disagree with the move. I for one visit the page one for seeing the table and two for checking the major points at the top. Having it at the middle is annoying. Regardless of whether wikipedias policy is this, that, or the other, as the above poster has said, we are the daily visitors. Whatever happened to majority ruled. What I see is someone moving the table blatantly ignoring the majority. Thenthornthing (talk) 13:54, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I also disagree with moving the table. That is about all I ever look at on this specific page. After that I generally move on to specific areas, often in cases that have been propted by updates in the table. There needs to be more focus on the other articles, so they do not get out of date. The table is a key componant of change. While the death categories may not get all the deaths, when most countries have under 100 and many under ten the table is reporting rapibly changing information. It needs to be easy to access and easy to edit.Johnpacklambert (talk) 19:58, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Just to note, I do accept the point of some of the editors above that some of the data (i.e. confirmed cases) is on the verge of becoming misleading, as countries such as the US and UK have essentially given up testing. The deaths data though still seems to me to be worth having at the top, and perhaps what we need to do is replace statistic for confirmed cases with either something like 7500+ cases (for the uk for example) or a note like "Widespread", as the data is still useful for understanding the approximate spread in the world. We need to get a table which is accurate qualitatively even if it is starting to fail to be accurate quantitatively.--Hontogaichiban (talk) 02:29, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Policy chosen by country <=> related to data accuracy

Could we perhaps state whether the country is still in 'containment phase', already in 'mitigation phase' or even in a 'post peak phase'? That gives an indication, how big a percentage of cases might be actually detected and reported.| FHessel (talk) 20:11, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Argentina is in mitigation phase, people affected are estimated around 107,000. http://www.buenosairesherald.com/BreakingNews/View/5770 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.59.172.162 (talk) 15:24, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Let's keep reporting here reasonbly accurate in all respects

Countries with less than two dead, as a separate list? So, now we have one little list, and a huge one where we have countries with 2,000 infected, 2 dead, and countries with 1 case, and everybody else healthy. There are even countries with 20 cases, and nobody ill any more.

I'm not saying that the situation is not alarming, but that it looks seriously unrealistic on the page. It's like the idea to move to reporting cases in thousands, and at the time there were like five countries with over thousand cases. Keeping lists even in number is a reasonable choice.

Keeping them uneven, as they are now, is not about reasonable reporting, but a biased one from the most affected part of he world. Yes, I heard from a friend in Brazil today that things are getting from bad to worse there, but still, it's not that bad worldwide (not yet).

I'm suggesting positive thinking among people making this page, and realistic reporting. If it gets bad (and it might), let's have it depicted here, but also, let's get some info about countries with a number of cases, and nobody ill any more. There are some countries successfully dealing with this flu (eg. Austria).

Genrally, FYI, I believe that most viral diseases among humans are being spread because of inapt governments, and uninformed, or irresponsible (or just too stupid, maybe even just mean) individuals. Sorry, I had to say that. Let's keep this page good and informative worldwide! Julian (talk) 02:13, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

The main reason, the list is divided in two sublists, is to avoid an information overkill on the main page. There is no intention to categorize the countries. And it would be very difficult to get to a consensus as to which criteria to use for a categorization. It was difficult enough to fix the criteria for ordering the list.

The real good point you made, is the question, how active is the virus currently in country xy? How can we depict that? How to discern between countries, which have only a few cases doubling every couple of days on the one hand and countries with a lot of cases, but not very much activity any more (e.g. Mexico, although I think, that Mexico is on the verge of a new outbreak, they managed to fight back the virus very well, but they did not manage to get rid of it. Strange not to get any updates from Mexico, isn't it? Ok they had their elections, but they also learnt the lesson, that emphasizing the health topic too much might damage their economical interests).

We have to find criteria that countries with lessened virus activity do not remain at the top of the list forever, only because they have had a big outbreak sometimes in the past. I am thinking along the lines of dividing the whole story in three tables, one labeled 'no recent cases' where we put countries, which have not reported new cases in, let's say a week or two. Secondly a table 'local/sparse activity', where we could put countries with less then (just arbitrary!) 100 cases during the past week. And a third table for 'widespread activity'. A big problem with this solution would be, that countries are not comparable in absolute numbers. But we do have this problem even now, because it could be disputed whether Argentina with approx 40 mio people and 60 deaths should not be put before Mexico with approx 110 mio people and 119 deaths.

Another possible solution could be the division between countries in 'containment'/'mitigation'/'post peak' phase (I have already presented that idea earlier). I do know, that this information is available for several countries, but can we just assume, that all the countries with less than 20 cases are in containment phase? And does it change anything, when countries with only a few cases suddely have a death case (e.g. Costa Rica had one confirmed case, when it reported its first death; or very recently: Jamaika).

All these thoughts have not yet ripened really and I would appreciate to hear some other opinions about the topic. | FHessel (talk) 09:26, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps reading CDC Telebriefing on Investigation of Human Cases of Novel Influenza A (H1N1) will give you some ideas. WAS 4.250 (talk) 11:18, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

If you have followed the list over time, you would see that the end of the main list has changed many times. The earliest I remember was when every country with less than 100 confirmed infections was on a sub-list, but there may have been an earlier cut off. Then it went up to 200 confirmed infections, than it went to deaths, and now to two deaths. It is arbitrary, but the main point is to have the top of the list be where the countries where the disease is most active are listed, and then the rest of the list for those people who want to know more. It is not in any way meant to be a value judgement, just a presentation of information in an easily processible way. If current trends continue, in a week or so we may move to having the main list only be countries with ten or more deaths from swine flu. Why deaths are considered to outrank confirmed cases as a method of sorting the list I am not sure, but I think there are reasons and it probably was discussed somewhere.Johnpacklambert (talk) 00:37, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Tanzania

There are just over 2,000 confirmed cases acording to the BBC [74] -- 86.25.8.20 (talk) 16:01, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Swine flu parties

Let's ad this interesting fact to- Swine flu parties! Coverage in reliable sources continues to grow. The concept is to catch the flu now and have some protection if a more severe version comes around in the next flu season. Before vaccines, there were chickenpox parties. "Swine flu parties" are a bad idea, per experts, but there have been articles about them in several countries in major newspapers and news channels, per Google news search [75], [76]. --86.25.11.150 (talk) 14:52, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I still think this is not really happening, the only people who understand this virus well enough to seriously think about doing such a thing are the specialist flu medics and other scientists who are familiar with it, they are most likely pretty confident that they would be able to avoid or treat any serious infection and would not want to be seen doing this kind of thing. Any documentation of the public doing it at the moment is probably a publicity stunt.--Hontogaichiban (talk) 11:27, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

new swine flu

FYI, while testing for A/H1N1-2009, a new swine flu in humans was discovered, see http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/media/nr-rp/2009/2009_0707-eng.php

This might merit mention somewhere.

70.29.208.69 (talk) 03:01, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

This could become important but it seems the news release is still too light on details for citing anywhere. But we should keep a watch out for more news. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 04:30, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

There are literally uncounted thousands (or more) of new flu strains every year in pigs, humans, and birds. Unless they both can spread and create notable disease, they are not worth anyone paying attention to. Flu virus genes are separate strands of RNA that both recombine (similar to sex) and mutate at a high rate. RNA is not near as stable as DNA. WAS 4.250 (talk) 08:30, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

South Pacific!

A US sailor has fallen ill and possibly even died [[77]] on a aid trip from US Samoa to Tonga, Kiribati and the Marshal Islands! The Yank either got it of a sick native or did the Seppo really bring it to the territory and cause Samoa's out break? --86.25.12.184 (talk) 19:28, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

First cases of tamiflu resistance

Is it worth mentioning in the article? So far, it has only been reported in a patient in Denmark. It looks like tamiflu is still effective everywhere else, but this new resistant strain could propagate. Excerpt: «Roche Holding AG confirmed a patient with H1N1 influenza in Denmark showed resistance to the antiviral drug. David Reddy, company executive, said it was not unexpected given that common seasonal flu could do the same. [[78]] I think it is well worth mentioning!It is a single isolated case that already mentioned in the "Timeline" article. If it is worth mentioning in the Timeline article, then maybe it should be mentioned here. Reoprts are also saying about the resistance of tamiflu in Argentina, but it seems that it also happening in Denmark, here is the article saying that the virus has gained some resistance to Tamiflu and elderly people are getting infected as much as young people too. [79]. It is now happening to a guy in Hong Kong to.--86.25.12.184 (talk) 19:28, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

North Korea (PDRK)

It's on RTE, a North Korean Communist party official has just died of Mexican swine flu!.--Qministrator (talk) 18:42, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Source?--86.25.9.212 (talk) 10:46, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Woefully out of date graphs

Could someone please update the graphs of number of cases? They stop at June 29. We need to see the progression of the number of cases and the number of deaths. Thanks! Edison (talk) 04:21, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Deaths/Confirmed Cases Percentage table???

I beleive a table is needed to accuratly compare infection by country. What percentage of the population has contracted the disease. Or perhaps cases per 100,000 people. might take some work but it can be done. Bramers (talk) 18:42, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what you are suggesting. We can't calculate own percentages as that would be Original research. We'd have to get the information from somewhere else. Barnaby dawson (talk) 18:58, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Such a table (in fact, several) already exists in 2009 flu pandemic by country. It could be moved or copied here. @Barnaby: Simple calculations (e.g. #Cases : Population) do not constitute original research (WP:OR#Routine_calculations). --Roentgenium111 (talk) 19:53, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There I disagree with you. They're not simple calculations. Dividing one influenza surveilance number by the other is simple but it also isn't how you calculate a mortality rate (especially during an pandemic). To do it properly (taking into account lag times etc.) would take a lot more effort and would be original research. Even a simple division is a choice of methodology with significant implications. We should wait for professionals to do these calculations and then quote them. 80.189.236.26 (talk) 20:16, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Anyone got a good idea of why English speaking countries appear to have a very high infection rate? The USA, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand all appear to have a high number of cases for their population. No European country appears in the table apart from the UK and Spain, and Spain has a fraction of the UK's cases.--Maclauk (talk) 09:04, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Maps of Chile

• 
  File:H1N1 Chile Map.svg
• File:H1N1 Confirmed Cases Chile Map.svg
  File:H1N1 Confirmed Cases Chile Map.svg

Why is Antarctica on these maps? There have been no reported deaths or cases in Antarctica, yet it is colored black/pink. And Chile is a signatory to the Antarctic Treaty staying its claim to Antarctica.

70.29.208.69 (talk) 07:30, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Criticism/Controversy Section

I would like to propose a Criticism or Controversy section based on the criticism of the pandemic in light of the number of deaths (I'm not aware of the current statistics; lost touch in recent days) but many criticisms have been given by verifiable sources (ie. Newsweek, McCleans, etc...) about the outbreak being overblown. I remember a statistic comparing the then (about two weeks into it) around '21' deaths compared to the half million annual deaths due to the common cold in the USA. I've seen other such criticisms but would like some other opinions before increasing the length of such an expansive article. MasteroftheWord (talk) 02:36, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Read the first subsection. That subsection makes clear that the numbers people are using to suggest that this is no big deal are not comparable to actual cases and deaths. People seem incapable of bothering to understand the sources of the numbers. Perhaps I should say that people seem incapable of bothering to understand. Did you bother to read the whole article before making a suggestion to change it? WAS 4.250 (talk) 14:55, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:V

The introductory Paragraph contains unreferenced conjecture, it is misleading as the quotes and contradictory statements ( migrating virus yet introduced by people) can easily mislead less critical thinking readers.

I suggest this be removed or relocated to a new section called "ASS U ME"d facts,

Here's the excerpt in particular that I find dangerous

"Experts now assume that the virus "most likely" emerged from pigs in Asia, and the virus was carried to North America by infected people. There is further evidence that the new strain has been circulating among pigs, possibly among multiple continents, for many years prior to its transmission to humans."

Reading this would indicate that somehow pigs travel ( yes the irony of flying pigs !) and that having met for a conference some where in the mysterious ASIA they then infected people who also attended and then returned home to "North America"

Show us the evidence ! WP:V

( I want to see some piggy boarding passes ! )

regards Seanwong (talk) 03:45, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

=;)

Read up on swine farming. Anyone can edit. Indeed. WAS 4.250 (talk) 14:59, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Faroe Islands

The swine flu has been detected in the Faroe Islands [80] --157.157.115.183 (talk) 12:13, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Ambiguous, inaccurate reference

"Evidence mounted through May 2009 that the symptoms were milder than health officials initially feared. As of May 27, 2009, most of the 342 confirmed cases in New York City had been mild and there had been only 23 confirmed deaths from the virus.[178]" The reference 178 does not mention anything about 23 deaths that I can see. Since a 23/342 or nearly 7% mortality rate is not what I would call mild, I assume that the 23 deaths refers to the whole of the US, not just New York. If that is the case then it ought to be written more like: "As of May 27, 2009, most of the 342 confirmed cases in New York City had been mild.[178] Throughout the US there have only been 23 confirmed deaths from the virus." 78.149.198.158 (talk) 11:20, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Literature recommendation

I recently came across this article in the New England Journal of Medicine [[81]] which is worth a look. | FHessel (talk) 18:05, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

UK death toll is 17

The UK death toll is now 17, please update and I have 'reliable source'.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8148162.stm

(86.170.162.197 (talk) 16:21, 13 July 2009 (UTC))

Reshaping the 2009_flu_pandemic_table

Please contribute with ideas for a new layout regarding the table in the related discussion | FHessel (talk) 10:04, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Upcoming Northern Hemisphere flu season: how should it be handled? (Proposal)

The fall flu season is fast approaching (approximately ten weeks, at most). There are already a number of news items appearing, regarding preparations, the vaccine, travel, airport measures, business continuity plans, etc.

Even more important, as a foreshadowing of what is to come, the virus is still on the move: there has been a spike in new cases in the US, new countries are getting their first cases and first deaths, stats show that the Southern Hemisphere did indeed get hit, as expected.

Very shortly we may find ourselves in an 'ongoing event' situation. The current article is quite long, and, I think there is a place for having the facts/orgin/history as one article, with a new article to cover the upcoming season. Perhaps, like Hurricanes, which have a main article, and then 'seasons' for reporting the new event, we could structure something similar.

If so, it would have the origins/historical context/medical facts in the main page, perhaps under a new title such as, "H1N1 Pandemic". Then, there could be a section which explains the seasnal differences between Northern and Southern Hemispheres, and East/West differences, followed by links to each flu season, and most of the stats/news items could go under the first link, with a name such as, "2009 Spring/Summer flu season", with the upcoming link being "2009 Fall/Winter flu season".

I think the above will help it be non-North America centered, as the Spring/Summer would include Northern Hemisphere starting out the season, with Southern starting in Summer; Fall/Winter would finish the Southern Hemisphere, and start the Northern.

The delinations would be somewhat arbitrary, and that could be noted as part of the introduction to the 'seasonal' section on the main page, perhaps with a mention to look at both the preceeding and following season of the one being read, for context.

As seasons progress, some information could be moved to the main article as historic content, for example, once many vaccine issues die down, the main article could expand its vaccine section to include final results (ie, after much confusion/debate/testing/etc. it was detemined vaccine X was the accepted standard). In this way, minutiae from the 'ongoing' season could be pruned back when it enters the main article. (I haven't worded this last idea as well as I would have liked, but hopefully one gets the gist of the idea).

I'm thinking, if there is some kind of consensous about this, we could frame it out a bit in discussion, and then hopefully a few of us could start work on it now, because even if the fall is only a minor increase, even a few more people dying, especially without underlying conditions, than in the spring, it will gather a great deal of attention and news stories.

Since I've written quite a bit here, I will start a new section, for responses to the proposal. Keep in mind, even if this season stays constant to what we had in the spring, it will still make headlines, and need to be covered, as the numbers will spike as the season progresses. Also, until another two seasons passs, we really can't sit back and presume it is 'safe'. After this fall season, regardless of severity, there will be renewed attention in the spring of 2010.

Thanks for reading through my proposal, and giving it your consideration. If there is somewhere other than here, that this idea should be brought forward, please do so, or contact me to do so. Thanks. Kavri (talk) 17:51, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism or bad mathematics

In the uk infected numbers is ~60000. It doesnt add up right in the totals so please fix it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.80.36.89 (talk) 18:38, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

"Triple reassortment of human, swine, bird"---only first part of the story!

Just like how the 'mainstream' media sometimes uses the buzz phrase "flu-like symptoms", you have well-dressed people playing it safe and not wanting to get it wrong regarding the origins of the disease. Media people trying their best, but mainly focusing on looking good and speaking oh-so well. Instead, we need to take a deep breath, and just accept that in a fast evolving situation, there are going to be all kinds of messy details. And we might start with the following by Dr. Robert Belshe.

Implications of the Emergence of a Novel H1 Influenza Virus, New England Journal of Medicine, June 18th.
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/360/25/2667

" . . . One group of viruses, described by Shinde et al.,[1] are triple reassortants of viruses from pigs, humans, and birds, called triple-reassortant swine influenza A (H1) viruses, which have circulated in pigs for more than a decade. The other group, described by the Novel Swine-Origin Influenza A (H1N1) Virus Investigation Team,2 is a recent reassortant of the triple-reassortant swine influenza A (H1) viruses and a Eurasian swine influenza virus, resulting in the swine-origin influenza A (H1N1) virus (S-OIV), currently being transmitted among humans.

"The two groups of viruses behave very differently. Triple-reassortant swine influenza A (H1) viruses are found in pigs and may occasionally be transmitted to humans but have not spread efficiently from human to human. S-OIV, in contrast, is not currently known to be epidemic in pigs (although pigs may be infected by exposure to humans), but it is exhibiting human-to-human transmission and has spread to several countries. Both viruses are H1 hemagglutinin viruses, which appeared in humans and swine in 1918 and have subsequently evolved, in both species, into divergent H1 viruses. The current situation is not "1918 again," it is "1918 continued," in that we are still being infected with remnants of the 1918 pandemic influenza virus.

"Most adults have substantial immunity to H1 variants that have circulated among humans from 1918 through 1957 and then again from 1977 through the present. Whether cross-reacting antibodies from previous H1 infections will provide protection against S-OIV is not known, but the epidemiologic features of the current S-OIV infections suggest that there may be partial protection from multiple previous influenza infections . . . "

"partial protection," that's good news, but it does make for a complicated situation as far as public policy.

And please notice from the first and second paragraphs that what has circulated for perhaps a decade is the pig version that can only occasionally be picked up by a human, and not very efficiently transmitted from human-to-human at all. The H1N1 starting April 2009 is a whole new ball game. Cool Nerd (talk) 23:08, 15 July 2009 (UTC) and Cool Nerd (talk) 23:32, 15 July 2009 (UTC) (it's hard to get it exactly right! But I am in there trying. I am you to be in there trying, too. Do not let perfectionism stand in your way)

[1]The Shinde et al. article is here: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/360/25/2616?ijkey=5ff97367b3da787e6e2e643a81844d048588b6ce

[2] the Novel Swine-Origin Influenza A (H1N1) Virus Investigation Team is here http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/360/25/2605?ijkey=1471afeea9196386f638215fdb923bb0abcb9f95&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha

External link recommendation

There is an up to date timeline on the spread of swine flu in the Balkans in 2009 at http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/20775 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tnosugar (talk • contribs) 12:18, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

UK update

Hello, I have noticed in the past 3 days, the UK section has not yet been updated. Is there any new information yet? And yes, I know this is NOT a 'chat forum', but I ask this to 'make the article better', thank you.

(86.170.162.197 (talk) 14:47, 16 July 2009 (UTC))

Me again. I just saw the BBC news, and it is now 29 deaths.

(86.170.162.197 (talk) 15:13, 16 July 2009 (UTC))

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8154419.stm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.170.162.197 (talk) 15:42, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

It should also be pointed out that there were approx. 55,000 new cases of H1N1 and 11 deaths in the last week in the UK. The majority of cases and hospitalisations are children, the risk of infection smoothly tails off proportionately with age. This is from a very detailed weekly report of flu cases available on the Health Protection Agency website[82]. --Diamonddavej (talk) 16:23, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Angola update

A old coddger has died of it on his farm, near Luanda [[83]], [[84]], [[85]], [[86]], [[87]]! --86.25.2.224 (talk) 15:38, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

your information is completely made up. All your links are none existent.--86.161.173.88 (talk) 19:26, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The table pointing every case should be moved to less-valuable real estate

As long as someone wants to reflect lab-confirmed cases for reference purposes, the bottom of the article is a good place to do it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.105.0.116 (talk) 03:12, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Data reporting and accuracy

I added the first paragraph back in (with one sentence deleted) because it contains important context for data reporting from past experience with seasonal flu. This is particularly the case with the passage addressing the reporting of flu deaths. Barnaby dawson (talk) 10:15, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Still a need?

I no longer think that the yellow "unconfirmed or suspected cases" is needed anymore for the diagram on the right.

as the table is now only documented confirmed cases along with confirmed or suspected deaths. What do others think?--^{The Legendary}_{Sky Attacker} 23:28, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Sky Attacker, for several months I have been an advocate that, it is a messy situation, why don't we let our readers just see this (instead of trying to interpret for them, buffer for them, etc)

There are probably good estimates, CDC, WHO, doctors in Argentina, in Australia, or just estimates, people trying their best and our readers can decide how much stock to put in a quote from an infectious disease doctor in Australia, for example. So, let's splash the best quotes we can find. Let's have several different maps, some showing only the laboratory-confirmed cases, some showing suspected. That's what I say. Cool Nerd (talk) 23:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Had to remove your totally pointless "splash." Add new information, if you have any, to the article, and in context. Your news bulletin on the lead was totally Uncool. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 02:59, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Including unconfirmed makes no sense at all at this point.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:08, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

50000?

I just noticed that the UK has '50000 cases' of swine flu. Are these 'confirmed cases?'

(86.170.162.197 (talk) 17:00, 16 July 2009 (UTC))

They are estimated cases, derived from surveillance of e.g GP & A&E consultations and people ringing NHS direct complaining of flu like symptoms etc. Its not feasible to test everyone for H1N1 flu, there are too many cases now (~99% of flu cases in the UK are H1N1). Given that, I think we should drop our adherence to laboratory confirmed cases in the table of flu cases where appropriate, its time to quote estimated rates of infection. If we don't adopt this policy, the lab confirmed cases will remain unchanged while deaths accumulate, we will give the misleading impression that H1N1 is becoming more pathogenic. --Diamonddavej (talk) 17:30, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Very, very good points. Probably more informative to give estimated number of cases. I remember about a month ago, Australia went to "Sustain Phase" where they were only testing if there was a specific medical reason. Otherwise, assume it's swine flu and treat with Tamiflu, and symptomatically.

I continue to think it's a big deal the sheer baseline of flu in the United States. 36,000 people die each year in the United States from just plain old garden-variety seasonal flu (other people can make adjustments for their own countries). If more people get flu this year because of less resistance to the new strain, even if H1N1 is no more lethal than seasonal, even if it's slightly less, you still may see greater total deaths, and these may largely be preventable. The vaccine issue remains huge. And there might be other smart things we can do as well. Cool Nerd (talk) 17:53, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

That baseline is estimated, which is why it's unfortunate that pundits are so quick to point at it. Not only do we need to be careful about including estimates in our own numbers, we probably need to find an article somewhere that'll tell us how many confirmed cases of flu death happen each year -- so we'll have a meaningful comparison when looking at the confirmed fatalities we have so far. Confirmed fatalities have been, and will continue to be, one of the most important data sets we have. It's easy to accept estimates, but I think we can do better.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:48, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

UPDATE GRAPH, Venezuela now has a death person

Thanks! Ministro Mantilla ratificó que virus AH1N1 está controlado —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.84.18.153 (talk) 04:15, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Egypt reports first swine flu death

Egypt on Sunday reported its first death linked to swine flu after a 25-year-old woman coming back from a pilgrimage to the Muslim holy places in Saudi Arabia died in hospital, the health ministry said. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS-World-Rest-of-World-Egypt-reports-first-swine-flu-death/articleshow/4796514.cms —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.203.187.168 (talk) 19:52, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Please change the table sort order back

There has been an extensive discussion about how useless the data on confirmed cases is -- to now begin sorting the table based on that useless data boggles the mind. It needs to be changed back to sort based on fatalities. I also do not see why a change like this was made without any discussion first.68.111.62.56 (talk) 21:00, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I have restored the deaths first sort order. The change was made unilaterally without discussion and violated the long standing consensus on what the sort order should be. --ThaddeusB (talk) 22:12, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Response section for proposal above on how to handle upcoming flu season

Hi, I've created this section, as the proposal itself was lengthy, and a fresh start for responses would help keep things manageable.Kavri (talk) 17:54, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the article will soon become unmanageable and some segmentation will soon be needed. However you will get immediate protest if you attempt to use season names as article headings, as your proposed naming scheme shows a clear bias to the Northern hemisphere. Why should the southern hemisphere be listed under "summer" when it is winter in those countries? Also "Fall" is an Americanism (the rest of the English-speaking world uses "Autumn"). I think a neutral name like "Jan-June 2009 or "First half of 2009" would be better. Manning (talk) 05:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the article is already unmanageable to some degree, and it will only increase in the coming weeks. I didn't intend for a bias at to the naming of 'seasons', it comes from the fact that we generally do term flu in terms of seasons, but using actual month groupings as suggested would be fine, or other suggestions are welcome. I hadn't realized that 'Fall was American-centric, as in Canada both get used frequently. More importantly, I think it is important to try and get some agreement on making this article the 'historic' H1N1 pandemic 2009, or some such, that links to an 'on-going' section, and that sections are delimited to some sort of seasonal or monthly grouping named as such. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kavri (talk • contribs) 21:05, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

35 deaths in australia

35 deaths now in Australia. http://www.healthemergency.gov.au/internet/healthemergency/publishing.nsf/Content/news-200709 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.203.187.168 (talk) 14:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Lab confirmed v's estimated infection rates

UK is now experiencing a rapid exponential increase in H1N1 flu cases, remarkable given its July. The flu infection rate now exceed the peak of the 08/09 winter flu season. H1N1 Flu is now so widespread, the UK no longer routinely lab tests for the virus. The UK lab confirmed figure will not be updated. It is now time to think about how to better present the flu infection rate - otherwise the table will give the misleading impression of gradually increasing lethality.

I propose quoting "cases per 100,000" where appropriate. --Diamonddavej (talk) 17:52, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

There is a question of original research. The current table is essentially ECDC confirmed figures (with a little bit of anticipation). To present a table of estimated figures we'd need a source which presents estimates together in a table. Otherwise its original research and potentially very misleading (if differing methods are used to make the estimates). Certainly mixing estimates with confirmed figures is not the way to go. Note that estimated deaths may also differ substantially from confirmed deaths (see the data accuracy and reporting section as to why). Providing an estimated deaths figures without an estimated infections figure or vice versa is not good.

What reason do we have for believing that we will need to deal with estimated deaths? If someone dies with flu-like symptoms, why wouldn't they be tested? They're giving up on testing everyone who has the flu - not everyone who dies. We need to give precedence to hard figures. Adding how many deaths occurred in the past week would be more useful than adding information on estimated infections. Those estimates have been all over the board whenever they've been given.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:41, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree that estimates are much better than confirmed numbers at this stage (and have been for some considerable time). But just don't have a source for estimates at the moment. Outside of the table we'd be ok because they'd be no synthesis. In the instance of individual numbers in the text I agree that estimates should be preferred to confirmed figures. Barnaby dawson (talk) 18:24, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

We should deal in facts, not guesswork. If you want to include any estimates in the pandemic page, they should be in a section clearly labeled "Infection estimates", and certainly not at the top of the article.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:41, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I was not clear, I'm not suggesting we calculate our own per 100,000 infection rate, I understand that is OR. On the contrary, the per 100,000 infection rate is available for the UK on the HPA website[88] (the UK infection rate is now 86.8 per 100,000). It is standard epidemiological practice to drop lab/medically confirmed cases and instead express infection rate as cases per 100,000 as a pandemic progresses. That data is now available for the UK and as the pandemic progress the per 100,000 infection rate will likely be published by other countries too. It also has the advantage that, as in the case of the UK, it tracks the weekly infection rate. Thus readers of the article will see the flu infection rate increase and decrease in the coming months/years. We could even create an useful graph of this data. --Diamonddavej (talk) 18:55, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

If we've got the numbers, and it sounds like a pretty good source, let's go with it. Let's include it in the article. The only thing I would add is that instead of +- whatever (for it is an estimate), let's go ahead and include several different authoritative estimates. That way the reader can see for himself or herself that it is a messy situation--How could it be otherwise?--and we don't need to stand in the reader's way and somehow buffer the information. Cool Nerd (talk) 00:03, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

86.6 is NOT an UK infection rate. Actually it is the "GP ILI consultation rate" obtained through the QSurveillance scheme. There might be (and most probably is) a relation between this consultation rate and the infection rate. But still, this number is not the infection rate. It is most important to understand, that all these indicators can only be interpreted in comparison. Either comparison over time or comparison between countries(if the methodology is the same). That is a very important reason for having world-wide comparable data and showing these data in direct comparison (such as a table). The number by itself has no informative value at all. FHessel (talk) 00:59, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Okay, GP General Practitioner consultation---the number of people going to the doctor reporting cough and fever? And since it's not now seasonal flu season in the UK . . .

So it's not a perfect number, but can't we still share it with our readers and give them enough information to put it in context? Cool Nerd (talk) 01:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining that there is a restriction on what figures are quoted; we need to compare the pandemics progress between countries. How about estimated number of infections? There are approx. 85,000 current H1N1 cases in the UK (55,000 new cases in the last 7 days). My main point is, we should start quoting approximate figures where lab confirmed figures are increasingly inaccurate. The UK stopped testing all suspected cases on 2nd July. I imagine that as the pandemic progresses, approximate numbers of flu cases will be the figure heath authorities will provide. --Diamonddavej (talk) 03:56, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Frankly, these estimates have no place here. It's bad enough when we were trying to compare lab confirmed cases between countries with different levels of testing rigor, but to begin trying to compare numbers once countries are pulling numbers out of their proverbial nether regions would be a mistake on our part.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:13, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Estimates are all that will be meaningful from now until after the pandemic has peaked, so perhaps a section on their nature and limitations might be useful. Servalo (talk) 06:57, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Since the WHO will stop counting cases, the oversized screen area devoted to the table of the cases it counted is of historical interest, only

"As of Friday, the CDC reported more than 40,000 laboratory-confirmed cases of the virus (commonly known as swine flu), 4,800 hospitalizations and 263 deaths. Experts believe more than a million Americans have been infected, however. Schuchat said the CDC would probably stop reporting cases soon because most people who are infected don't get tested.

What does this have to do with deaths? How, precisely, is the ever-changing number of fatalities "of historical interest, only"? Laboratory-confirmed cases have been useless for comparison purposes all along because every country tests differently -- but fatality figures are another story.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:25, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

"The World Health Organization, which has reported nearly 100,000 confirmed cases worldwide, said Thursday that it would stop counting cases because that required too much unnecessary work by health authorities. The agency had said a week earlier that it recommends local agencies no longer test for the virus unless they have not previously had cases or there is an unusual outbreak.

above via http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-swine-flu18-2009jul18,0,6483644.story

Canada will also quit counting —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.165.11.15 (talk) 16:30, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't matter one bit if WHO stops counting the number of cases. Individual countries continued their own official counting of their cases, irregardless of WHO's direction. Leave the table where it is! Roman888 (talk) 01:15, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The table contains no accurate information on either actual cases or deaths. The source data is only useful for revealing the spread of this new strain; but since this Wikipedia table lacks date information, it is not even good at that. It is worthless. It is data compiled by people who know nothing about what the data means. Go write an article on something you know something about. Or read the sources this article uses and then you too will know why this Wikipedia table is worthless. The worth of something is not measured by the time put into it. WAS 4.250 (talk) 17:37, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Please don't be rude. ike9898 (talk) 00:50, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Not only are you rude, you're wrong. The figures we use for fatalities are the most accurate figures we'll ever have, unless some new global government steps in after the pandemic, orders every suspected case dug up and exhaustively tested. Fatality figures are based on national health department figures, and figures assembled by investigative journalists. The only objection you could have with them is that they don't include fatalities that weren't tested for flu, but since we have no way of forcing anyone to test every death for H1N1, the figures we are using are absolutely the best available. The fact that normal flu is blamed for 36,000 deaths a year when in truth nobody tracks how many die from the flu, and very few deaths are actually directly blamed on it, does not mean that we should allow the same sloppy, pulled-out-of-thin-air attitude to apply to Wikipedia and our own summation of this unfolding event. I don't know why a small minority here is so stubborn on this one issue, but to try to ignore or dismiss our only neutral numerical data on the pandemic makes no sense. These numbers aren't made up. They aren't estimates. They aren't lies. They're the record of known, tested, confirmed patients who have the swine flu, and who have died because of it. To suggest that they don't belong front and center in our coverage of the pandemic is absurd. 68.111.62.56 (talk) 21:20, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The table was misleading and did not contain accurate data. The WHO stopped counting all cases, as did several individual countries. The UK stopped testing on the July 2nd and only a fraction of cases were tested in the US; the CDC estimated on the June 25th that more than 1 million Americans had H1N1. I deleted the table and replaced it with two maps showing the distribution of H1N1. This addresses the concerns expressed by those who wanted to keep the table, that it was useful for tracking the spread of the disease. --Diamonddavej (talk) 03:03, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

If you have sources to refute the fatality figures used in compiling the table, please share with the class. Otherwise, removing the only hard data we have on the expansion of the pandemic is little better than page vandalism.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:25, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

To that end, please remove the second map as it is misleading (and does not contain much data at all). New Zealand has had sustained community transmission for a while (hence the shift of pandemic response phase to 'manage it')[89].
It is a shame to have lost the deaths column of the table, since, at the very least, New Zealand is doing definitive testing on any possible fatalities due to novel H1N1. The information on deaths is reliable and updated every day. I believe most countries' health organisations would have these numbers publicly available.--121.73.176.163 (talk) 04:06, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

THe WHO said that they will stop counting each cases but they will be updating the deaths, so if you guys decided to keep the table, i think at least the deaths should be kept. --Vrysxy! (talk) 07:03, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Discussions on removing the table (and other dubious data) are further down the road on the 2009 flu pandemic by country page, that's where the table is sourced. If you want to keep the table, let your opinions be known there. There is an argument against the claim that it keeps track of all deaths - there is inevitable disparity between tracking deaths between devloped and non-devloped nations. Who can confidently claim that all deaths are counted in Sub-Saharan Africa?

The argument that because some nations won't admit to fatalities we should simply ignore all data on deaths makes no sense. The data we *do* have comes from reliable, attributable sources. As such, it absolutely should remain in the pandemic article. It's the best hard data we've got on the pandemic. If anything, it still needs an expansion to include a column showing how many deaths have been reported in the past week, so users can easily spot where the flu is currently causing casualties.

That said, if New Zealand (and others) is doing a good job tracking infections and deaths, then very well, cite data on the 2009 flu pandemic in New Zealand page. Since the UK, Canada, US and a growing list of others countries are not now and never counted all cases, I can't see why keeping a table that mixes myth and fact is wise - the progress of the pandemic is best displayed qualitatively not quantitatively. -Diamonddavej (talk) 14:34, 19 July

2009 (UTC)

Keep the table as it is. Just because a few countries and WHO have stopped counting the number of cases, doesn't mean we should remove the table. There are other countries that still making their own individual official counts. Plus the European Centre for Disease Control is also tabulating the number of cases worldwide, including the death totals for each country. What is the reason for removing the table other than knee-jerk reactions after seeing WHO and some countries stop counting the number of cases? Roman888 (talk) 06:48, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Here, on this page, is the appropriate place to discuss whether the entire table should be repeated in its entirety here, on this page. Its unfortunate prominent position here comes at the cost of moving down off the initial screen and hence obscuring a great deal of information more current, salient and useful than the table. If the table is kept, move it to a position appropriate for reference matter.

Which brand-new sections of the pandemic article do you feel merit a place of prominence ahead of our consolidated fatality chart? And, what do you mean precisely by "initial screen"? Do you just mean that they have to scroll down to get the rest of the article, or do some portions of it cut off on some Web browsers?68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:25, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

If the point of the table is to show the extent of spread, it is actually counterproductive. Unwary readers will confuse documented cases with the actual extent of spread -- hundreds of times larger. Of far greater value would be information about authoritative estimates of the actual extent of spread -- so great the WHO will no longer undertake to report cases. If the point is to provide data for readers to distill fatality ratios, the distilled ratios (currently around 6 per thousand) would be both more concise and more useful by far. This history table is, and will remain, weighted heavily to the early cases, when more cases were being reported and tested. It thus gives undue weight to the results of those cases, which occurred when swine flu was milder, and fatality ratios derived from it were lower, than they currently are according to more recent data. Hence the history reflected in the table is of little current salience at best, and confusing at worst. This history table merits a position toward the end, appropriate for historical data. Not at the top.

Could you please provide links to the articles where it's shown that hospitals, newspapers, and national medical bureaus are going to stop paying attention to folks who drop dead with flu conditions in a pandemic? Lab-confirmed infections are now a matter of historical interest. Fatalities are not. Not only would estimating fatality ratios begin to knock at the door of original research, which is forbidden here, but it'd be taking a badly broken piece of data (lab-confirmed infections) and allowing it to skew our good data (deaths). What in the world would possess us to do so? Put the lab-confirmed infections into an archive somewhere, add a column for fatalities within the past week, and keep the fatality table at the top of the page. Deaths will remain current and pertinent until nations try to cover them up -- and even then, a table like this could help make their absence more visible.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:25, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I have added a note of explanation just below the table's title, to try to make sure that the reader realizes what the table really represents - a summary of official reports, and that there is reason to believe that the true numbers are different. I support keeping the table but I also agree that it is very easy to misinterpret what these numbers mean and don't mean. If you can improve the wording of the 'disclaimer' please do, but I think it should be as brief as possible; right now it fills two lines the way it is formatted in this article. ike9898 (talk) 19:06, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Putting deaths figures in perspective

GB (talk) 21:27, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

The article states 30 deaths in the UK and has not been updated for over two weeks. The actual number of deaths from Swine Flu in the UK reached a count of 29 last week. Let's put the figures in perspective showing the ratio between the number of cases/deaths from Swine Flu and the total population of each impacted country. Based on the WHO figures:

			Cases	Deaths	Cases	Deaths
	Country	Population	Laboratory confirmed	Confirmed	Ratio between country population and number of cases (%)	Ratio between country population and number of deaths (%)
	United States	306 971 520	40 617	300	0,0132	0,0001
	Argentina	40 000 000	3 056	186	0,0076	0,00047
	Mexico	109 955 400	14 229	128	0,0129	0,00012
	Chile	16 454 143	11 239	68	0,0683	0,00041
	Canada	33 212 696	10 817	49	0,0326	0,00015
	Australia	21 007 310	14 037	37	0,0668	0,00018
	United Kingdom	60 943 912	10 649	30	0,0175	0,00005
	Thailand	61 500 000	512	28	0,0008	0,00005
	Brazil	191 908 598	1 175	20	0,0006	0,00001
	Uruguay	3 477 778	550	20	0,0158	0,00058
	Peru	29 180 900	2 796	14	0,0096	0,00005
	Costa Rica	4 195 914	503	12	0,012	0,00029
	New Zealand	4 173 460	2 443	11	0,0585	0,00026
	Paraguay	6 831 306	175	10	0,0026	0,00015
	Ecuador	13 927 650	394	8	0,0028	0,00006
	Colombia	45 013 672	202	8	0,0004	0,00002
	El Salvador	6 000 000	452	6	0,0075	0,0001
	Bolivia	9 247 816	715	5	0,0077	0,00005
	Philippines	96 061 680	2 668	4	0,0028	0,000004
	Spain	40 491 052	1 302	4	0,0032	0,00001
	Guatemala	13 002 206	374	2	0,0029	0,00002
	Venezuela	26 414 816	281	2	0,0011	0,00001
	Dominican Republic	8 745 000	108	2	0,0012	0,00002
	Jamaica	2 804 332	44	2	0,0016	0,00007
	Hong Kong	7 018 636	1 964	1	0,028	0,00001
	Singapore	4 608 167	1 217	1	0,0264	0,00002
	Panama	3 309 679	541	1	0,0163	0,00003
	Brunei	381 371	346	1	0,0907	0,00026
	Honduras	7 639 327	123	1	0,0016	0,00001
	Egypt	81 713 520	130	1	0,0002	0,000001
	Tonga	119 009	2	1	0,0017	0,00084
	Other		17 174	0
	Reports Total	6 773 000 000	145 538	963	0,0021	0,00001

What perspective, precisely are you going for here? Bearing in mind, of course, that the point of Wikipedia is to avoid "putting" anything in perspective. To provide a perspective would be to violate neutrality. We're to provide neutral information. For instance, with your figures, someone could jump to the inaccurate conclusion that the swine flu is no big deal. Particularly if your numbers were coupled with the criminally inaccurate guesstimates experts like to trot out showing how "normal" flu kills a half-million people a year worldwide, and 36,000 in the United States. When, in reality, *nobody* dies from the regular flu. Not where flu is listed as cause of death. The fatality figures we have for swine flu aren't made up, which is why comparing them to the mythical 36k/500k is such a pointless endeavor. Swine flu fatalities point to real people, who are really dead, and who wouldn't be dead had this swine flu not entered the human population. If it's perspective you're looking for, find some fatality figures for regular flu based on actual, confirmed, case-by-case deaths due to the flu, and put those side-by-side with what we've got so far from the swine flu pandemic. Or, find some figures on swine flu hospitalizations, and put those up next to regular flu hospitalizations in the same geographic region. The numbers I saw weeks ago for Utah (I don't go digging for data, I leave that to the more dedicated folks -- I just swing by Wikipedia, to enjoy the fruits of their labor) showed that swine flu hospitalizations had already nearly reached the same numbers as Utah would see over the course of an entire season of regular flu. If anything, I object to our including quotes from experts who refer to the 36k/500k mythos, because both numbers merely serve as an empty reassurance to the public that whatever happens, it's not so bad. It's just the flu. At the very least, I'd like to have those quotes carry a disclaimer about the fact that 500k/36k is purely conjecture based on extrapolation and inference.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:16, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

In calculating cases/population and deaths/population the above table carries a heavy point of view. Namely that confirmed infections are tolerably close to total infections (almost certainly false in the USA for example) and that confirmed deaths are tolerably close to total deaths (which historically hasn't been true according to the CDC). The perspective it introduces is not NPOV and cannot become part of this article.

I cannot agree with 68.111.62.56 regarding the status of historical estimates of seasonal flu mortality. These are figures for which we have multiple independent and credible sources. Furthermore, I have seen no source claiming that historically confirmed deaths estimate total deaths (as 68.111.62.56 seems to be arguing). Barnaby dawson (talk) 11:10, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Hong Kong and Macau part of China (PRC)

Please reach a consensus on both Hong Kong and Macau either being part of China (People's Republic of China) or separate territories. Both Hong Kong and Macau have separate numbers of confirmed cases in the table while the map shows one confirmed death in mainland China. (One death only in Hong Kong) Jolazzzang (talk) 06:21, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Inconsistent articles

There are a lot of differences between the pictures, tables and articles about this subject. For instance, in the timeline there is a death in Malaysia, which is not in the picture nor in the tables. And China is black on the map, but I can't find a death in China on the tables and neither on the timeline. Similar cases with North Korea, French Guyana, and some others... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.82.134.159 (talk) 14:01, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

South Pacific!

Chew on this, mate! A US sailor has fallen ill and possibly even died [[90]] on a aid trip from US Samoa to Tonga, Kiribati and the Marshal Islands! The Yank either got it of a sick native or did the Seppo really bring it to the territory and cause Samoa's out break? --86.25.11.99 (talk) 15:18, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

North Korea (DPRK)

I found this in an archive and will Google up some sources...

It's on RTE, a North Korean Communist party official has just died of Mexican swine flu in Sepo county!.--Qministrator (talk) 18:42, 9 July 2009 (UTC) --Qministrator (talk) 18:45, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

...assuming it has not been gaged by the reclusive nation's politburo.--86.25.11.99 (talk) 15:28, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Pandemic table compromise

WHO:Global Pandemic case count ceased
Sorry to post at the top of this thread, but I wonder if this issue has now been overtaken by the passage of time and the announcement by WHO that even WHO will not maintain a global case count WHO. Most countries with community transmission - the ones with most rapid increase in cases - have limited testing only to those cases who have severe disease or severe underlying medical conditions requiring hospitalisation. So given that people are having difficulty updating a table that even WHO believes is inaccurate, it can probably be dropped from the article and the above reference to the cessation of global country case counts be linked. I think its important to remember that as wikipedia is an encyclopedia and not a weekly or daily epidemiological newsletter it should not strive to provide a daily/weekly editing/editorial cycle - which is destined to fail and therefore undermine wikipedias credibility as a reliable and encyclopedic source of information. Perhaps better to put energy into identifying the most stable and reliable source of updates. --Cranberryzap (talk) 01:21, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Is there any reliable place that's listing deaths in one central location? Any death info from WHO lags badly -- and there is a clear interest in that information. Dropping lab-confirmed infections makes sense, but there is absolutely a need and a rationale for keeping the chart with death statistics. Pulling the entire table simply because we no longer can justify displaying infection figures makes no sense. What argument is there against showing fatalities? Numbers are numbers, and since the fatality figures we display come from multilingual sources, it would seem that the table data is serving a very clear and very essential role. I want to know how many people have died. I believe, in a real-time pandemic, it's one of the only meaningful pieces of data we have access to on a daily basis. If there is further information which can put it into context (like an entry discussing the difference between the "estimated" annual deaths from seasonal flu, and the number of fatalities directly attributed on death certificates) I'm all for including it in the pandemic article. But it is maddening to have such a handy source of summation continue to go missing because editors think they know better than I do what information I can handle, need, or deserve. And, why shouldn't we have daily, or even hourly, updates on a current event? Especially a current event affecting the entire planet? I've never read a Wikipedia entry and felt I was being done a disservice because it contained information which was too current for my use. There is nothing about fatality figures which undermines Wikipedia's credibility. Every figure is attributed to a source. We aren't creating data with this table. We're making data available and accessible. Which is precisely what Wikipedia should do. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.111.62.56 (talk) 01:55, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I think that the 'Laboratory confirmed' column could be removed if this would help find a consensus. The confirmed deaths column is of real interest though and should not be removed. The way in which the entire table (and therefore the information that it contains) has been repeatedly removed without consensus is of concern. --Dionliddell (talk) 05:08, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I very much agree, Dion. I don't see the lab confirmed data as being very useful at this point, it now seems an archival matter. Could we collapse it and leave a link to it? I also agree: The repeated removal of the table is bordering on page vandalism, at this point. I've never weighed in on a Wikipedia page like this before, but this is the first time I've ever seen someone deliberately take information away when it comes attributed to reliable & public sources. I've seen Wikipedia entries truncated because someone showed they were without attribution, but never this. To remove information because you've decided readers aren't interpreting it "correctly"? How can that possibly be a good idea, or in keeping with Wikipedia's goals of neutrality? Isn't the entire point of an encyclopedia to provide information, particularly hard facts & figures? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:15, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe the table with lab confirmed cases and deaths is becoming increasingly inaccurate. It is clear that it is now a gross underestimation. It would be better to move this table to a new article and drop it from the main article. Keeping it would be otherwise misleading. I understand that the people who have worked hard in compiling the data for the table will not feel good about this, but I don't see any strong reasons to keep this table now. 79.72.130.70 (talk) 13:10, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The death tolls are not inaccurate, because they do not come from the WHO. They come from the individual governments who have their own agendas.--121.73.176.163 (talk) 04:18, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

As per all of the above talk contributions, I have removed the column of confirmed cases. It is now a table of number of deaths by country. Since wikipedia stores all previous versions of the page, of course, the previously collated confirmed cases numbers are automatically archived, so none of that effort has been lost. However since the confirmed cases numbers are no longer relevant, meaningful, or useful (if they ever were), to put those numbers somewhere else and link to them, or leave them hidden, would still be misleading. Now - someone needs to heavily edit 2009_flu_pandemic_by_country in order to remove references to confirmed cases in the text and graphics. 81.102.157.87 (talk) 15:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

As per all of *what* talk? There was no consensus, except by a small handful of mostly non-logged-in users. The table--which was as accurate as possible and *very* helpful, and which many folks have worked many hours building--was removed inaccurately, prematurely, and unilaterally. It needs to be restored ASAP.Sqlman (talk) 16:40, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Information is not wrong as a matter of fact. WHO only said it is not necessary to count cases, go tell the Canadian or Australian authorities that their reports are useless. Of course we´re not talking about infected people, but it´s a measure (of laboratory capacity if you wish). If it is misleading then a note should be put: cases in different countries are not directly to be compared to each other, or: ceased counting as of mmm/dd. I will restore the cases column if there is some consensus, or else the information will be LOST.Acolombo1 (talk) 17:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The information is meaningless, worse, it is misleading. WHO has deemed it so. If you read above, the points are made by all who wrote here. This is the main article, and your template serves it. We understand that you have spent time collating the "confirmed cases" numbers, but your efforts do not justify the inclusion of the numbers in wikipedia. The consensus is that they should be deleted. They don't belong anywhere on wikipedia, perhaps they did once (that is debatable), but certainly not anymore. Please don't take it personally, it is not a slight on your information-gathering efforts, it is just that the information has no place on wikipedia, or any decent information resource. 81.102.157.87 (talk) 18:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You're being dishonest. Is it intentinally so? There was no consensus, unless by consensus you mean you decided, and a person or two concurred half-heartedly. The consense, if there is one, is to quit screwing with the table. It's not yours to delete.Sqlman (talk) 18:35, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The information is just information, and it´s out there, it´s YOU who think it has no place in wikipedia. If you don´t want it in this page, don´t modify the template, just create another. Or maybe i´ll do so, so as to finish with this matter, and put it somewhere else. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Acolombo1 (talk • contribs) 19:44, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

---

The various positions taken so far on the placing of the pandemic WHO figures table are:

1) At the top of the page.

2) In the middle of the page next to the data reporting and accuracy section.

3) Not in the page at all. (taken in preference to 1 but not in preference to 2)

As an attempted compromise I have placed it in the data reporting and accuracy section, linked to it from the top of the page and moved the data reporting and accuracy section to just below the introduction (so as close to the top of the page without compromising the introduction or violating WP:UNDUE.

I truly hope that this will be considered an acceptable compromise by everyone. Please do not just revert this and return the table to the top of the page as this violates wikipedia policy. Barnaby dawson (talk) 12:50, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Talking of wikipedia policy: As I summarize at the moment, there are 2 persons voting for moving, 1 is indifferent (Spaully) and 5 persons are voting against. So you just ignore the majority and then cite wikipedia policy?!? | FHessel (talk) 13:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

There has been no vote and I'm not sure Spaully or others would agree with your characterization of their opinions. Furthermore wikipedia does not have a policy of making decisions by mob rule. Informal votes can occur but are not necessarily binding. Wikipedia does have a neutral point of view policy, however.

Discussion so far has been over whether the table should be removed or placed at the top of the article. My compromise is a third option that has not been disussed. I boldly implemented it in the hope that this could resolve the dispute. I still hope it will. Barnaby dawson (talk) 13:31, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I doubt, that it is improving the discussion, that you label your fellow wikipedians as mob. Mind the etiquette! | FHessel (talk) 15:02, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Mob rule is not a term for the people but the process. You're counting of discussion commentors is mob rule not a vote. Please do not accuse me of incivility where there was none. Barnaby dawson (talk) 16:04, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Barnaby, "Mob Rule" is in most people's vocabulary a method of denigrating some position. It is a highly loaded term with a very negative connotation. Words have a common menaing, one understood by all, and if you insist on speaking in your own unique jargon, than do not be surprised if others take offense at it. That said I strongly reccomend that the table be placed at the top of the article. The information that the table represents is not only what the WHO and other groups report, but the type of figures that virtually every newspaper cites. When publications report on the number of swine flu cases in a state, county or region they mean the confirmed cases, even when they do not say so. It even appears that some deaths counted as from swine flu have been reclassified as not related to swine flu. China has the most outstanding example. The point of putting the table at the top is that it gives a quick over-view of the subject. The current event notice is a warning that the information is unstable and not comparable to long-standing and well researched information, but an attempt to get information to people quickly. This in and of itself constitutes a warning that the table has liits. Due to the nature of the process used by the people who read the table, this is much more likely to cause the readers to weigh and balance the table than putting it in a different section. The fact of the matter is reading the header is almost unavoidable, but if we move the table, most people will still just look at the table and not read the long and involved text that it is next to.Johnpacklambert (talk) 20:09, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Could we keep the table at the top, but adapt it as I said above, focusing on deaths, which probably are more accurate and perhaps broad orders of magnitude for the level of infections? - Perhaps consider changing the table into a colored map?--Hontogaichiban (talk) 11:29, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

According to Keji Fukuda the WHO will come up with suggestions in the next days, as to how countries could proceed from testing everybody towards a statistic based approach. I would recommend to wait, which data will be available on a world wide level. Then we could decide, how to change our table. | FHessel (talk) 14:48, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. (Thanks for the link.) That page says "We will be putting up the updated guidance within the next few days and hopefully this will help with the monitoring globally for this pandemic." WAS 4.250 (talk) 09:35, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I vote for at the bottom of the page. The officially confirmed figures are of very little value since it is generally known and acknowledged officially that these represent a tiny fraction of the total cases, and are more of an artifact of testing than of spread. The huge table at the top tends to crowd down information that is more relevant and salient.

The increasing irrelevance of the current official numbers is underscored by the WHO telling countries with confirmed cases that they can stop testing every case (as though they had not stopped already):

http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/content/influenza/swineflu/news/jul0709influenza.html

WHO to ask countries to ease novel H1N1 testing

Lisa Schnirring * Staff Writer

Jul 7, 2009 (CIDRAP News) – The World Health Organization (WHO) said today it will soon advise most countries to ease the volume of testing for novel H1N1 influenza ...

In the next few days the WHO will release its new surveillance recommendations, advising countries that have already confirmed cases to cut back on testing all suspected cases and move toward larger surveillance indicators such as influenza-like illnesses or pneumonia hospitalizations.

"This will also ease the burden on labs," he said, adding that countries will still be urged to continue testing when unusual situations surface, such as severe cases, clusters, and symptoms that haven't previously been reported. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.101.142.199 (talk) 01:47, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

In the middle of a global issue affecting all of us, a small group of completely inflexible people keep hijacking the only hard data we have on this pandemic. Fatality totals are an absolutely legitimate piece of information even as confirmed cases have lost their relevance. Removing them is an obnoxious, petty abuse of the collaborative nature of Wikipedia. Until they're returned, this article needs to have the neutrality dispute tag added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.111.62.56 (talk) 19:16, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I do not believe that the 'table issue' has been adequately resolved. I note that the table has been removed without consensus. I will reinstate the table and point the POV template to this talk section. I'm a newbie at this, so please forgive me if I haven't followed the correct protocol. --Dionliddell (talk) 22:48, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

The table also serves use in giving information on the first confirmed cases in countries. If we get rid of tallies, then where are we to report cases from newly confirmed nations? CaninePitDog (talk) 05:19, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Deaths are relevant, and in my country (NZ) the Ministry of Health delivers an official daily update on this countries death toll (due to H1N1)[91]. This simple figure (along with its reference) provides the reader with a quantifier (and qualifier) for the single most important aspect of this disease: its capacity to produce fatalities. Why hide this information? The WHO has pulled out of the numbers game, so be it; removing the WHO totals seems like a logical first step to the resolution of this 'Pandemic table issue'. --121.73.176.163 (talk) 06:21, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the tables should remain as it is. Leave the tables on the top right of the article. If WHO has pulled out of the making official counts, we can look at various alternatives. One is that several countries are doing their own individual count. The second is that the European Centre for Disease Control is also tabulating a daily count for all countries worldwide, including recording the number of deaths. Those are better alternatives instead of knee-jerk reaction of deleting the entire table. Roman888 (talk) 06:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

There was no consensus, or even much that could be deemed 'all the talk above'. The table--which was accurate, and which many folks have worked many hours for--was removed inaccurately, prematurely, and unilaterall. It needs to be restored ASAP. If not, do away with the whole thing.Sqlman (talk)!

Four paragraphs of introduction, and only one reference?

One reference at the very end, a May 26th press conference of CDS's Anne Schuchat. It's a fine reference, but it supports everything in the above four paragraphs?

It sure appears to me that often our primary focus is wordsmithing and only secondarily the content of the article. Cool Nerd (talk) 16:48, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

"four known strains of influenza A virus subtype H1N1" ???

This blurs history. The one that circulated for perhaps a decade was a triple reassortant of human/pig/bird virus. That one was pig-to-pig, sometimes pig-to-human, and maybe very occasionally human-to-human. The freely transmissible human-to-human virus is the new one which resulted from a reassortant of another pig virus with the previous triple reassortant. Cool Nerd (talk) 16:56, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

"most likely" from Asia ???

No need to add any of this, check out patent #US20090060950A1. It's Baxter Labs patent on H1N1 that was registered on 28th August 2008. They obviously made it.

This is what the lead paragraph of our article says:

'Experts now assume that the virus "most likely" emerged from pigs in Asia, and the virus was carried to North America by infected people.'

Wow. And where are our references for these experts so stating? I think there might be a confusion between Eurasian pigs--a type of pig--and where the virus originated. And this is the very type of confusion that is likely to result when the emphasis is one wordsmithing (and "neutral" language and perfectionism and buffing and polishing) rather than the content of the article.

And although there is no particular reason to blame Mexico for getting unlucky, it sure seems like the epicenter of the pandemic is the area surrounding Mexico City. Or, perhaps on the other hand, it might be Asia afterall. Asia is almost half the world as far as population goes. And Asia has a lot of small farms, as well as large farms. It certainly is possible that the virus originated there and was transmitted by humans to Mexico (as our article currently states!). But we need to have some references if this is in fact the case. Cool Nerd (talk) 17:14, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

The lead is supposed to summarize the content of the article and so each claim in the lead should be both expanded on and sourced in the body. Look for your sources there. Did you read the rest of the article? WAS 4.250 (talk) 17:29, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

So, it's hunt and peck and we have to go hunting? We can't even include footnotes in the introduction? Cool Nerd (talk) 17:32, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

"and the virus cannot be transmitted from foods" That is also from the lead paragraph of our article. Oh, really? Even if someone coughs all over a plate of food? This is exactly the type of thing a public health official would say in a soothing tone of voice. And the truth is, we just don't know. And that's an uncomfortable state to be in. We don't want to go overboard taking health precautions, but on the other hand . . . Now, the article's right about cooked pork. You're not going to get it from cooked pork. But if a food service worker coughs into his or her hand and later uses that hand to open up and put on plastic gloves (probably better just to wash your hands and not use gloves!) . . . I'll count it as an unknown. Probably is possible, question is how likely. Not too different from viruses on a surface, and someone else touches the surface and later brings that hand to nose or mouth. Again, let's go with the best references we can find. Cool Nerd (talk) 17:33, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Not a bad place to start might be the June 18th New Eng J Med editorial by Robert Belshe
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/360/25/2667 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cool Nerd (talk • contribs) 17:36, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

That source and cite was already incorporated into the article - section on "Mutation potential." It was added to the context of the article instead of having a snippet "splashed" in the lead. The lead is supposed to be only a "brief summary" of material that's expanded within the body, and cites are not added twice except where the material is of a "controversial" nature (per Wiki Guidelines). As for "hunt and peck," try the TOC. And if that's still too much reading, try "Control + F" to search a page. Hope that helps. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 18:05, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

That's what a named reference is for. You name it once when you cite it and then use it however many times you refer to it. Every reference used in a summary lead should be named, because it will also appear in the body of the article. Simple, right?LeadSongDog come howl 22:44, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

It's actually the opposite of that: "should not be named" unless the topic is likely to be controversial. See WP:Lead [92] i.e. "avoid redundant citations in the lead." But I realize that many, if not most, readers go no further than reading the lead section, so I sometimes keep a named cite there for details that seem to be very important, in order to save a reader time in verifying. But too many footnotes can clutter up the summary section, IMO. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 01:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

The section "Mutation potential" has some good material, notable the scary possible of H1N1 combining with Avian flu, notably the good news announced by Anne Schuchat in June 2009 that all H1N1 tested around the globe was "genetically identical" to that within the United States. But no where in the section does it make the claim that the current swine flu originated in Asia. That is a free-standing claim made in our introduction and backed by no reference.

It's in the "Virus origins" section --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 01:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

As far as the suggestion we use named references, sounds good. We can go short in the introduction and expand in the sections, and both can have a reference. People will just need to be a little bit careful deleting named references. And as far as the Dr. Belshe reference from New England J Medicine, we can probably go shorter in the introduction: "a recent reassortant of the triple-reassortant swine influenza A (H1) viruses and a Eurasian swine influenza virus." Maybe something like that. Cool Nerd (talk) 00:49, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I concur, The assertion that at a Mysterious ASIAN Piggery conference has resulted in humans being infected or that infected swine were transported to the continental USA is without foundation. I spent a week and half googling and looking for any indication that this was supported and have nada. In the mean time my comments on this were purged. so I'm making the changes to the Lead to remove the absurd statements Seanwong (talk) 13:06, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The virus in argentina is different from the one in US and Mexico

Is that enough to be considered a mutation? Here's the news link, official confirmation should be available shortly.

[93] Sarejo (talk) 22:01, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, let's wait for the WHO to comment on this. Tim Vickers (talk) 22:15, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I can't read Spanish but from the google automatic English translation I saw nothing in the text to suggest there is any significant difference in the virus. Flu viruses mutate all the time so finding non matching sequences isn't necessarily big news. Barnaby dawson (talk) 15:19, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

What does this mean?

"with pre-existing or underlying medical conditions" - underlying conditions would be pre-existing surely? Whatever "underlying" means. Rich Farmbrough, 09:51, 23 July 2009 (UTC).

It means to have a 'medical condition' with the lungs. (86.170.160.255 (talk) 10:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC))

Perhaps we should say "pre-existing, especially respiratory illnesses". Rich Farmbrough, 10:59, 23 July 2009 (UTC).

Some of the medical experts, CDC, and news sources use the terms interchangeably, and they are almost synonyms. If there's any difference IMO, it seems to imply that "pre-existing" is a symptom that the person is usually fully aware of, and often diagnosed. Whereas "underlying" implies a "condition," such as obesity or heart problems, that the person may be aware of, but has ignored. There's probably no harm in keeping both terms even though they overlap in meaning. --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 20:05, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

RfC on swine flu statistics

Link to RfC, input welcome. Tim Vickers (talk) 19:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Confirmed cases gone?

Where are they? Jolazzzang (talk) 19:54, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

See the section above this. Tim Vickers (talk) 19:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

WHO: "H1N1 flu pandemic fastest-moving ever, now pointless to count every case.

"The World Health Organization said earlier on Thursday that the H1N1 flu pandemic was the fastest-moving ever and that it was now pointless to count every case." July 16, 2009. Available at BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8154419.stm Reuters, http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSN1642970020090716 Ergo, the giant table at the top of the article counting every case is confirmed to be pointless, as many have long suspected. The valuable screen space it occupies should be put to non-pointless use. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.165.11.165 (talk) 21:40, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

"In past pandemics, influenza viruses have needed more than six months to spread as widely as the new H1N1 virus has spread in less than six weeks." - WHO.[94]

And the incident rate in the UK is falling up a cliff. I agree, the table is useless and a waste of space. The progress of the pandemic should be illustrated by cases per 100,000 where data is available. --Diamonddavej (talk) 23:06, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Why don't you read the original? It does not say, that it is pointless to count every case. Actually it says:

The increasing number of cases in many countries with sustained community transmission is making it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for countries to try and confirm them through laboratory testing. Moreover, the counting of individual cases is now no longer essential in such countries for monitoring either the level or nature of the risk posed by the pandemic virus or to guide implementation of the most appropriate response measures.

The WHO is painting a differentiated picture of countries in different stages of the pandemic. For countries in early stages of the pandemic it is still important to count cases (and there are many countries still in the early stages). These countries would have no place in a table, where we only count cases by the 100,000. And data will not be available either, at the moment it is enormous to publish numbers like that, but in one or two weeks, nobody will bother to give such estimates (it will not be new(s) any more). And we can also do better, than just throw the table out. Many people want to know, where exactly we stand. And I cannot believe, that any text is able to resemble such a fast evolving situation in real time. So I think the best way is to adapt the table to the new situation and use it to give the readers the quick overview as to where the pandemic is most active right now. | FHessel (talk) 00:44, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, many people do want to know where we stand right now. And it is a fast evolving situation. The question I ask is, Why are we attempting to stand between people and information? Why are we spending so much time and effort trying to pretty up a table? We are making things too hard on ourselves. (Yes, the table has been good practice, all skills are transferrable, but if things start to happen quickly . . . we will need to experiment developing some new skills. Get in there and make some mistakes! And as long as they are transparent mistakes, it's all for the good.)

One method I have proposed is a "Current Situation" section, mainly news articles because that's what's most readily available, but also CDC announcements, WHO announces, etc.---when you find something good, go ahead and excerpt it when you get to the first good part. Tell us where you found it and what date it is. Leave it transparent. Trust your fellow readers to do some of the work and possibly incorporate into the main body. New articles are added at top and older articles are dropped off the bottom.

It is a "messy" situation. And instead of merely telling our readers this, why don't we let them see for themselves?Cool Nerd (talk) 01:11, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Pandemic (H1N1) 2009 briefing note 3 [as above]
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/notes/h1n1_surveillance_20090710/en/index.html
16 JULY 2009 | GENEVA " . . . to closely monitor unusual events, such as clusters of cases of severe or fatal . . . " That has been the crucial question all along--How likely is it that the virus will mutate into something more lethal? Cool Nerd (talk) 00:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

The UN may have given up counting due to some goverments fakeing figures and running cover-ups.--86.25.2.224 (talk) 15:38, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Do you all agree that the table is completely useless? I don´t think so. While some countries have stopped counting cases, all of the countries are still counting deaths, officially and by journalists, that gives a magnitude of the situation. Though I have to admit the page looks cleaner now.Acolombo1 (talk) 20:29, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree, it was less than helpful. The table probably, all too often, illustrated laboratory testing capacity rather then the real flu incidence. On the June 25th, the CDC estimated that the US had more than 1 million H1N1 cases, while the table of lab confirmed peaked at ~34,000.[95] A research group in the UK says the true attack rate (percentage infected) many not be known until after the pandemic is over, the number ultimately revealed by testing people for antibodies to the virus. --Diamonddavej (talk) 21:42, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I have to say I've been using the table here to track numbers and it's greatly appreciated. I'd rather they be include, but if not, at least put a link to where they ARE being kept. Or is Wikipedia giving up and no longer providing consolidated numbers? Kf6spf (talk) 23:05, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

The table should be kept as some countries are doing their own case counts irregardless of whether WHO has stop their own counting. Also its important to keep tabs on the number of deaths so the future we can make an accurate prediction on the % who have been affected fatally.Roman888 (talk) 15:48, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

No we can't : The tests being conducted on a minority of cases, the datas are irrelevants. Nor we should since it would be a original research. Iluvalar (talk) 19:02, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

You're flat out wrong. Deaths are not irrelevant. In fact, fatalities are probably the most relevant piece of data we have -- and have nothing to do with the laboratory-confirmed cases argument. The fact that countries will no longer test everyone with the sniffles for H1N1 does NOT mean that they're going to quit tracking who dies from it. Fatality figures are essential, they aren't original research, and they need to remain at the top of the article.68.111.62.56 (talk) 06:18, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

You're right, let put that 779 identified deaths worldwide in the last 3 months alongside the 250 000 to 500 000 annual deaths for typical epidemics at the top of the page. It's certainly the most relevant fact we have. Iluvalar (talk) 23:21, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

The 250 000 to 500 000 annual deaths for typical epidemics have nothing to do with this, you´re putting things in perspective.Acolombo1 (talk) 13:17, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

That's not comparing like with like, though. The first figure is a flu surveilance figure and the second is an estimate. Even in the US these figures have not historically been comparable (a difference of 20 times is not unusual). The figures are probably even further out of line worldwide. We'd be better off with an estimate of the number to have died from H1N1 so far and I haven't seen anyone try to produce such an estimate yet. Barnaby dawson (talk) 12:40, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I agree that number of official cases of H1N1 and related deaths are not irrelevant, even though WHO or some countries have stopped counting the number of cases. Most countries are still counting the number of cases, including the European Center for Disease Control who is tabulating the number of cases. And as such the table should remain at the top of the table. We shouldn't use the argument regarding estimates vs official counts, to delete or move the table.Roman888 (talk) 12:46, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Lead as summary

Am reverting some lead material in order to maintain its purpose as a summary. The body material was removed and added to the lead only, with the explanation that it was a "duplicate entry." Per WP:Lead section, we should try to keep the lead as an introduction, so the body should be the place to have the details and citations. The lead is supposed to duplicate some of the body material.

The edits also changed the citation format to what the editor called a "standard cite format," which is really just a templated form. I see those kinds of changes done a lot, and it's usually not a problem. I personally use the simpler form because it requires a lot fewer words; is easier to edit; and allows for multiple referencing with the simple "ref name" tag. I rely on WP:Citing sources (excerpts):

Editors are free to use any method; no method is preferred . . . . Once a style is selected for an article it is inappropriate to change to another, unless there is a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style."

For a citation to appear in a footnote, it needs to be enclosed in <ref> tags. You can add these by typing <ref> at the front of the citation and </ref> at the end. Alternatively you may notice below the edit box there is a list of "markup" which includes <ref></ref> - if you highlight your whole citation and then click this markup, it will automatically enclose your citation in ref tags. Optionally, one may add the name attribute by using <ref name="name">details of the citation</ref>. Thereafter, the same footnote may be used multiple times by adding <ref name="name"/>.

--Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 19:32, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

1) Citation format: You are referring to WP:Citing sources, but your quotations are misleading. They refer to one of five ways of presentation ("Citations are usually presented within articles in one of five ways"), namely 'General reference', 'Footnote', 'Shortened footnote', 'Parathentical reference' or 'embedded link'.
The section citation styles will give you an introduction, which information is typically included in references. Furthermore "you should follow the style already established in an article, if it has one. Where there is disagreement, the style used by the first editor to use one should be respected."
2) I do accept, that you moved my clarifications to the data reporting section. What I cannot accept is, that you are reintroducing a false interpretation of the WHO statements. Please read carefully the NYT article. You will see, that they refer directly to the WHO briefing note of July 16. Now, this briefing note does not justify the NYT statement, moreover the directly linked WHO document 'Interim WHO guidance for the surveillance of human infection with A(H1N1) virus' states, that even if they are not reporting individual cases anymore, "all countries should inform WHO on a weekly basis of their [...] deaths." (page 6), which is contrary to the NYT article. Is there a justification for deleting the primary source and using a secondary source, which is citing the primary source in a faulty way? Clearly not!! I will change the article accordingly, and please, do not use the faulty NYT citation again.
3) Only as a minor point. The NYT writes:
"Many epidemiologists have pointed out that, in reality, millions of people have had swine flu, usually in mild form, so the numbers of laboratory-confirmed cases were actually meaningless. And performing the tests has overwhelmed many national laboratories."
Your citation says:
"partly because data estimates, according to many experts, were becoming "meaningless" and laboratories were overwhelmed simply testing for the flu"
On such a way the experts are now saying something about the overwhelming of labratories, which the original NYT article did not say in that way. I will not change that, because I think, that you will find a better solution than me.
FHessel (talk) 15:30, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Maybe WHO's statements are changing too often. You quoted them as saying "all countries should inform WHO on a weekly basis of their . . . deaths," as why the NYT story is faulty. But all I could find that was similar to that quote is the one below, and actually makes the NYT conclusion more correct than the "faulty interpretation" you mentioned. At best, the WHO statements seem fairly ambiguous as to their future reporting requirements and they are clearly not requiring countries to report all cases, just clusters, deaths, etc.

WHO statement: [96]

For all of these reasons, WHO will no longer issue the global tables showing the numbers of confirmed cases for all countries. However, as part of continued efforts to document the global spread of the H1N1 pandemic, regular updates will be provided describing the situation in the newly affected countries. WHO will continue to request that these countries report the first confirmed cases and, as far as feasible, provide weekly aggregated case numbers and descriptive epidemiology of the early cases.

For countries already experiencing community-wide transmission, the focus of surveillance activities will shift to reporting against the established indicators for the monitoring of seasonal influenza activity. Those countries are no longer required to submit regular reports of individual laboratory-confirmed cases to WHO.

--Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 22:03, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok, let me take you by the hand. WHO 'Pandemic (H1N1) 2009 briefing note 3 (revised)', where you got the above sentences from is closing with the statement "Updated WHO guidelines for global surveillance reflect in greater detail these recommended changes, ..." followed by a 'RELATED LINK' named 'Interim WHO guidance for the surveillance of human infection with A(H1N1) virus'. This guidance document, which is to be used by national authorities containes detailed reporting forms and it describes, among other things, the reporting requirements for the three phases:

A. Early detection, investigation and risk assessment

B. After detection of the pandemic virus: description of the epidemiology and assessment of the early cases

C. Continuous epidemiological and virological monitoring of influenza activity

Within that last section, in the subsection 'Reporting requirements', you can find as first point:

National health authorities from all countries should inform WHO on a weekly basis of their qualitative assessment of the geographical spread, trend of cases, intensity of disease, impact on the health‐care system, and deaths.

It is still the same as it has been 2 weeks ago, nothing has changed. And WHO has not declared anywhere, that they are not asking member states to report death cases.

Last not least: You could have easily found that just by following the link, which has been attached to this statement in the 'Data reporting and accuracy' section.| FHessel (talk) 12:51, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Britain's 100,000

Health Secretary, Allan Johnston is saying by the end of August there could be 100,000 new cases per day by the end of August —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.164.137.106 (talk) 14:17, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

No, it's only 55,000 [[97]], Sir!--86.25.8.46 (talk) 14:02, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

UK update

55,000 Brits are ill [[98]]! --86.25.11.197 (talk) 13:16, 24 July 2009 (UTC) The CDC say it's only 12,000.--86.25.11.58 (talk) 13:45, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

OK!--86.25.14.95 (talk) 14:31, 24 July 2009 (UTC)