# 4549
A veritable treasure trove of information regarding the clinical presentation of pandemic H1N1, assembled by a panel of experts for the World Health Organization, was published today by the NEJM on their Influenza Center Website.
For the details, you’ll want to read the whole report, but Robert Roos, CIDRAP’s News Editor, has put together an excellent summary.
First this report from CIDRAP News.
WHO panel offers clinical profile of H1N1
Robert Roos
News Editor
May 5, 2010 (CIDRAP News) – A panel of experts assembled by the World Health Organization (WHO) has published a clinical profile of pandemic H1N1 influenza, using data from scores of studies to fill in details of the broad picture that has emerged over the past year.
The report, released today by the New England Journal of Medicine, affirms that the disease has taken its heaviest toll on young adults and children but otherwise generally resembles seasonal flu.
The international team of 15 authors writes that the overall estimated case-fatality rate (CFR) has been less than 0.5%, with estimates ranging all the way from 0.0004% to 1.47%, reflecting uncertainty about the true number of cases. The US CFR has been estimated at 0.048%, a bit higher than the United Kingdom's estimate of 0.026%.
About 90% of those who have died of the virus were younger than 65, while hospitalization rates have been highest in children under 5 years old and lowest in the elderly, the report notes.
The link and an excerpt from the NEJM Influenza Center article, which is well worth reading in its entirety, follows:
Volume 362:1708-1719
May 6, 2010
Number 18
Clinical Aspects of Pandemic 2009 Influenza A (H1N1)Virus Infection
Writing Committee of the WHVolume 362:1708-1719
During the spring of 2009, a novel influenza A (H1N1) virus of swine origin caused human infection and acute respiratory illness in Mexico.1,2 After initially spreading among persons in the United States and Canada,3,4 the virus spread globally, resulting in the first influenza pandemic since 1968 with circulation outside the usual influenza season in the Northern Hemisphere (see the Supplementary Appendix, available with the full text of this article at NEJM.org).
As of March 2010, almost all countries had reported cases, and more than 17,700 deaths among laboratory-confirmed cases had been reported to the World Health Organization (WHO).5 The number of laboratory-confirmed cases significantly underestimates the pandemic's impact. In the United States, an estimated 59 million illnesses, 265,000 hospitalizations, and 12,000 deaths had been caused by the 2009 H1N1 virus as of mid-February 2010.6 This article reviews virologic, epidemiologic, and clinical data on 2009 H1N1 virus infections and summarizes key issues for clinicians worldwide.
