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Category Archives: pneumonia

February 2, 2010

Once again, flu and bacterial co-infection

With the H1N1 pandemic trending down, it may seem that the question of how much bacterial co-infection affects the outcome of flu is less important than it was. But though the pandemic is subsiding — for ever, for this season, or just until a third wave, who can say — researchers are just now getting [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in Hib, MRSA, PVL, influenza

December 3, 2009

NEJM: Antibiotics for pneumonia in H1N1

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The New England Journal of Medicine has been running an open-access blog on H1N1 flu, and they’ve put up a post on when to give antibiotics to prevent secondary bacterial pneumonia, including MRSA pneumonia, in flu patients. There’s a table of key clinical points to consider, and these important points are made: For the child or adult [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, MRSA, antibiotics, influenza

November 26, 2009

CDC warns of deaths from H1N1 flu + bacterial infections

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Over at CIDRAP, my colleague Lisa Schnirring writes tonight about the CDC’s concern over increasing numbers of deaths from bacterial pneumonia in people who have come down with H1N1 flu. We’ve talked about this before here. Our concern of course has been MRSA, and there is good evidence that there have been fatal MRSA infections in [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, influenza, vaccine

November 2, 2009

It’s World Pneumonia Day

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Readers, we talk all the time here about the unexpected and deadly attack of MRSA pneumonia, both on its own and as a sequela of influenza infection. But we should acknowledge that MRSA pneumonia is part of an epidemic of pneumonia, an under-appreciated disease of severe lung inflammation that takes the lives of 2 million [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in MRSA, influenza, vaccine

September 30, 2009

MRSA involvement in H1N1 flu: UPDATE

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The CDC’s MMWR report on their analysis of bacterial co-infections in H1N1 flu deaths has been placed online here. And there are two excellent analyses of it by the marvelous blogs Effect Measure and Mike the Mad Biologist.

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, MRSA, influenza, vaccine

September 29, 2009

More evidence of MRSA involvement in H1N1 flu

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When the H1N1 pandemic started at the end of last April, few of the case-patients seemed to have any secondary bacterial infections. This was unusual: In the 3 20th-c pandemics, the only ones for which there are good records, bacterial pneumonias seem to have accounted for a high percentage of illness and death. But H1N1 [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, MRSA, influenza, vaccine

September 10, 2009

Child deaths from flu + MRSA: CDC confirmation

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Hello again, constant readers. It’s been an exciting few weeks at Casa Superbug. I’ll spare you the details — most of them are both grueling and trivial — but out of the murk, here is a piece of excellent news: SUPERBUG has been edited, revised and sent back to the publisher, who has sent it [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in CDC, H1N1, MRSA, children

August 19, 2009

Another death from H1N1 flu + MRSA

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Thanks to a commenter who alerted me to this sad story: A teenager in Austin died of a combination of H1N1 flu and MRSA pneumonia. Constant readers will know that we have been watching for this for a while; MRSA pneumonia is a known and dangerous complication of any flu infection. For stories for CIDRAP and [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, MRSA

August 7, 2009

Catching up on some reading: health care reform, food bugs, vaccine, MRSA+flu

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Folks, while I was caught in travel hell, some excellent stories and blogposts were released. Here’s a quick round-up of recommendations for a rainy weekend: At Roll Call (covers Congress like a blanket), Ramanan Laxminarayan, PhD MPH, of the rational-use-of-antibiotics project Extending the Cure and infection-control physician Ed Septimus, MD make a strong argument for including [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in MRSA, animals, food, vaccine

June 23, 2009

H1N1 and MRSA – first disclosed case

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Readers, once again there’s a lot of MRSA-related news piling up, and I’ll try to roll some of it out over the next few days. But first, today we have to deal with an event that many of us have been anticipating, though not with any pleasure: the first known report of a MRSA death [...]

Written by Maryn McKenna

Also posted in H1N1, MRSA, influenza