CDC: 10 percent of New Yorkers had swine flu last spring

Well, let's hope that this trend doesn't hold for the rest of the country. In a report scheduled to be released this week, the CDC is expected to announce that about 800,000 people--or one in 10 New York City residents--had swine flu last spring.

Since April, swine flu killed 47 people in New York, or less than 1 percent of those infected, and since July, there's been little swine flu activity, city health officials said.

Still, it's worrisome to hear that a crowded city like New York could generate such a high rate of infection during what is considered by experts to have been the slow flu season.

While New York has some particularly difficult disease control issues to address, this is part of a growing trickle of news suggesting that the coming H1N1 season may be worse than originally predicted. Given this news, do you think the CDC's prediction of 70,000 cases nationwide during the high season in the fall/winter still makes sense?

To learn more about this announcement:
- read this UPI.com piece [1]

Related Articles:
Study: Half of healthcare workers might refuse H1N1 vaccination [2]
Swine flu outbreak shines spotlight on lab-tech shortage [3]