Altameroy Blog

Swine flu has reached pandemic proportions in the UK, prompting health experts to move from containment phase to treatment phase in dealing with the disease. With the virus spreading rapidly among the population, containment is out of question. This change in strategy means a shift from distributing drugs to close contacts of confirmed patients to a more restrained use of anti-virals to treat those infected.

Scotland witnessed the first patient in the UK infected by the H1N1 virus. Scottish Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon said that the virus has infected a large number of people in the past few weeks in the UK. Community transmission of the virus is further spreading the disease, and so treatment phase has to begin soon before the situation worsens. However, this is no indicator that the virus is becoming more potent. It just means that a steep rise in cases of infection has been observed, and therefore changing the combating strategy has become necessary.

In this treatment phase, anti-virals will always be there in place for patients detected with the virus. However, clinical tests will determine whether a person really has swine flu before prescription of anti-virals. This is because pandemic flu symptoms like cough, cold, headache, and fatigue are common, and people without swine flu can exhibit the same. Routine lab testing will give way to reporting of numbers of infected cases in different regions, on a weekly basis to keep track of the spread.

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In this context, health secretary for England Andy Burnham said that treatment is the only answer to counter the rapid spread of the disease. The virus is spreading fast every week, and if things are not under control, then by the end of August, a daily count of 100,000 infected persons will not be surprising. An emergency response towards treatment was already expected, as it was common knowledge that a prolonged containment strategy was not going to work.