Page 6 - HOH

A28 SCIENCE
Saturday 7 december 2019
U.S. flu season arrives early,

driven by an unexpected virus

By MIKE STOBBE such viruses can be hard tions, and 900 flu-related
AP Medical Writer on children and people deaths nationally.
NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. younger than 50. The most intense patient
winter flu season is off to its Louisiana was the first state traffic had been occurring
earliest start in more than to really get hit hard, with in a six states stretching
15 years. doctors there saying they from Texas to Georgia. But
An early barrage of illness began seeing large num- in new numbers released
in the South has begun to bers of flu-like illnesses in Friday, CDC officials said
spread more broadly, and October. the number of states with
there’s a decent chance Children’s Hospital New intense activity rose last
flu season could peak Orleans has already seen week to 12. Flu is wide-
much earlier than normal, more flu cases this fall than spread in 16 states, though
This May 20, 2019, file photo shows a Mexican gray wolf. health officials say. it saw all of last winter, said not necessarily at intense
Associated Press The last flu season to rev Dr. Toni Gross, the hospi- levels in each, the CDC
up this early was in 2003- tal’s chief of emergency said.
EPA rejects ban 2004 — a bad one. Some medicine. Last month was Last flu season started off
the busiest ever at the hos-
as a mild one but turned
experts think the early start
on poison bombs may mean a lot of suffer- pital’s emergency depart- out to be the longest in
ing is in store, but others say
10 years. It ended with
ment. Officials had to set
it’s too early to tell.
around 49,000 flu-related
up a triage system and
against cattle predators “It really depends on what add extra shifts, Gross said. deaths and 590,000 hos-
pitalizations, according to
“It is definitely causing
viruses
are
circulating.
There’s not a predictable symptoms that will put you preliminary estimates.
By ELLEN KNICKMEYER trend as far as if it’s early it’s in bed for a week,” includ- It was bad, but not as bad
Associated Press going to be more severe, ing fever, vomiting and di- as the one before it, when
WASHINGTON (AP) — Trappers can keep using sodium or later, less severe,” said arrhea. But the hospital has flu caused an estimated
cyanide bombs to kill coyotes and other livestock pred- Scott Epperson, who tracks not had any deaths and 61,000 deaths and 810,000
ators, the Trump administration said Thursday, rejecting flu-like illnesses for the U.S. is not seeing many serious hospitalizations. Those
calls for a ban despite repeated instances of the de- Centers for Disease Control complications, she said. 2017-2018 estimates are
vices also poisoning other wildlife, pets and people. and Prevention. Health officials tend to new: The CDC last month
The Environmental Protection Agency’s interim decision There are different types consider a flu season to be revised them down from
newly restricts use of the so-called M-44s within 600 feet of flu viruses, and the one officially underway when previous estimates as more
of a home and 300 feet of a public road or path. Users causing illnesses in most — for at least three weeks data — including actual
also would have to post two warning signs within 15 feet parts of the country is a sur- in a row — a significant death certificates — came
of the poison bombs. prise. It’s a version that nor- percentage of U.S. doc- in.
The agency’s assistant administrator, Alexandra Dunn, mally doesn’t abound until tor’s office visits are due to In both of the previous two
said in a statement that the EPA had worked with the March or April. flu-like illnesses. That’s now flu seasons, the flu vaccine
Agriculture Department “to ensure there are safe and That virus generally isn’t as happened, CDC officials performed poorly against
effective tools for farmers and ranchers to protect live- dangerous to older people said this week. the nasty predominant vi-
stock.” — good news, since most The agency on Friday es- rus. It’s too early to say how
The Center for Biological Diversity and other conserva- flu hospitalizations and timated that there have well the vaccine is per-
tion advocacy groups had sought a ban on the de- deaths each winter occur already been 1.7 million flu forming right now, Epper-
vices, which typically are covered with smelly bait, and in the elderly. However, illnesses, 16,000 hospitaliza- son said.q
are designed to eject deadly sodium cyanide when an
animal stops to inspect and gnaw on them.
In 2017, one of the devices injured a 14-year-old Idaho
boy walking near his home and killed his pet Labrador.
Collette Adkins, carnivore conservation director at the
center, cited two earlier instances this century of the
devices spraying sodium cyanide on people out hunt-
ing for rock specimens or walking their dogs.
Federal wildlife trappers and hunters reported killing
6,579 animals with the devices last year, including more
than 200 other nontargeted animals, including bears.
“You’re out hiking with your dogs and your children, and
you come across these, you have to be lucky enough
to see one of these signs,” Adkins said. Any dog “that’s
running around is going to get killed.”q

In this Feb. 7, 2018 file photo, a nurse prepares a flu shot at the Salvation Army in Atlanta.
Associated Press