Travel Alert: Canada Beset With Growing “Deadly” H1N1 Flu Cases
By Esther Tanquintic-Misa
Au.ibtimes.com
January 6, 2014
People wanting to travel to Canada have been advised to take necessary precautions as the country is currently beset with a growing number of the deadly H1N1 flu cases.
As of Monday, the statistics from the Public Health Agency showed that Canada’s latest flu season had so far claimed 13 lives, all due to the deadly H1N1 strain of Influenza A.
Three deaths were in Saskatchewan, five from Alberta and another recent two from Toronto. British Columbia and Manitoba along with several other eastern provinces have also reported seeing cases of H1N1 among the sick patients.
Health authorities blamed the Canadians themselves for their complacency to get their preventive shots against the fatal flu strain which largely hit the world in 2009/2010. At least 428 Canadians died in those pandemic years. Global deaths reached between 151,000 and 575,000.
Alberta has established mass immunisation clinics in four communities. It takes a complete 14 days for the vaccine against H1N1 to be fully effective in protecting a person.
Although those over 70 are the most susceptible to the H1N1 strain, the younger Canadians were told to be vigilant.
“We haven’t seen young people dying, but we’ve certainly seen serious illness in younger people and we don’t know yet, of course, the full size of the pandemic for this year,” Dr Rupert Kaul, head of infectious diseases at Mount Sinai Hospital, was quoted by CBC News.
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