4 ms·
Seems to agree with Google's estimates, although they don't break things up by age: http://www.google.org/flutrends/ http://www.google.org/flutrends/ Before ev
by andreyf 17y ago
Seems to agree with Google's estimates, although they don't break things up by age: http://www.google.org/flutrends/ http://www.google.org/flutrends/
Before everyone panics, however, I'm pretty sure this kind of statistic is self-reinforcing: if reports of flu are higher, and those reports are broadcast, people are more likely to go to the hospital when they exhibit flu symptoms, making the flu counts higher yet.
The media coverage of the swine flu might very well have set off this cycle.
Addendum: it isn't necessarily a bad thing - according to this hypothesis, if people who would have died of the flu this year are more likely to go to the hospital, and so less people should die. Or it might be that those who die of flu have reasons for not going to the hospital unaffected by media.
- tomjen2 17y agoYeah, that makes sense - sometimes I really want to smash the media guys so hard. But I also wonder if I person dies in a hospital, isn't shouldn't there be a legal course of death on the death certificate? Because then we might have something to compare with.
- roc 17y agoTrying to draw trends from a single cause of death is much harder than it sounds. Particularly in the case of things like influenza, which rarely kill anyone directly. What you'd really need are actual electronic medical records, so you could track symptoms, progression, treatments, etc.
- dpcan 17y agoWell, that's just it isn't it. More people with flu symptoms are going to the hospital and being diagnosed with flu, whereas in the past, they stayed home and got better. All because of bullshit reporting like this: http://www.krem.com/topstories/stories/krem2-102009-flu-death.237ef85fb.html http://www.krem.com/topstories/stories/krem2-102009-flu-deat... A women felt ill. Then felt a little better. Then got ill again within a few days and died in the Hospital overnight. Without even CONFIRMING that it was Swine Flu, they are reporting it like it is, and they are scaring up everyone in town to think that if they have a tickle in their throat they are going to die in 3 days.
- axod 17y agoIn the UK, you're told specifically not to bother going to doctor/hospital etc if you have swine flu (Unless you have complications/other conditions etc). We had it in July or so. It was kinda like a normal flu :/ The media loves to scare the hell out of everyone - gets them to buy stuff. Sad, but I can't see that ever changing.
- Anon84 17y agoWe had it in July or so. It was kinda like a normal flu :/ You might want to take a look at the bottom right panel of Fig 2: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1741-7015/7/45 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1741-7015/7/45 ;)
- Confusion 17y agoThe October peak for Western Europe isn't here.
- axod 17y agoYup that's what they thought would happen. They were raving in the papers that everyone would have it in sept/oct, schools wouldn't open, etc. What actually happened was that most people got it over the summer holidays afaik.
- btilly 17y agoThere is much truth to that, and you have to expect some exaggeration in numbers. However http://scienceblogs.com/whitecoatunderground/2009/10/whats_the_harm_pediatric_flu_d.php http://scienceblogs.com/whitecoatunderground/2009/10/whats_t... points out that pediatric deaths from flu this year are pacing about twice a normal year, and are accelerating. So there is a real issue. Similarly in certain areas hospitals are running out of ER beds. That's highly unusual and is objective evidence that there is a real problem under the hype. When all is said and done, though, I'd expect a death toll somewhere in the 50-100,000 person range. Which sounds horrible, but is a pretty small fraction of the population. For comparison it is on par with traffic fatalities in a 2 year period, or normal flu fatalities over 2-3 years. But that number could go up sharply if a lethal mutation emerges and spreads as happened in 1918.