CHICKEN BUCKETS: H1N1 Swine Flu kills 6 people, leaves 14 critically ill in Greater Houston area!

HOUSTON – Health officials say there have been six confirmed deaths from H1N1 in the Houston area recently, KHOU 11 News confirmed Thursday afternoon. That includes the four deaths at Conroe Regional Medical Center.

At least 14 people have become critically ill in Harris, Montgomery and Jefferson counties, including the four patients at Conroe Regional Medical Center.

This is the same strain of H1N1 that caused a pandemic in 2009. Doctors have been seeing hundreds of new cases recently in Texas and nationwide. In fact, H1N1 is one of the viruses included in this year’s flu shot.

Health officials from all over the region spent Thursday afternoon in a conference call comparing notes about all the cases. They suspect that all of the cases at the Conroe Regional Medical Center are H1N1, or what used to be called the “swine flu.”

Officials in Montgomery County, which is where this all started, are meeting to formulate further plans.

All the jurisdictions in the region are working together to create a profile of these cases, so doctors know what to look out for. That will be shared with the Centers for Disease Control and the Texas Department of Health.

The CDC has already offered assistance on this cluster of cases. The illnesses started with flu-like symptoms, then progressed to pneumonia and, in some cases, organ failure. All of the patientsl initially tested negative for the flu.

News about the illness has people packing into doctors offices and clinics.

At the Conroe Urgent Care Clinic Thursday, at least 18 patients came in with flu-like symptoms.

“We’re testing at least five to seven people positive for H1N1 [daily] as opposed to October when we hardly had any," said Physician Assistant Derrick Goodwill.

The commonly used RAPID flu test is not very reliable.

“The recommendation right now is to give Tamiflu to patients even if they don’t test positive,” Goodwill said.

That is also why Montgomery County health officials now plan to use a more reliable, but costly and time-consuming test on those patients sick from the ‘mystery’ bug and those who died from it.

Commentary

Houston Fatal and Severe H1N1pdm09 Cases Increase
Recombinomics Commentary 12:00
December 21, 2013

The Harris County patients were all men, ages 45, 50 and 53. Two of them had underlying health issues, including cardiovascular disease and obesity.

H1N1 is suspected in at least nine other deaths in eight regional hospitals, and that number is expected to grow quickly.

Four of those cases were at Conroe Regional Medical Center. Two patients that died in Beaumont likely had H1N1. We are waiting to learn the location of the other three deaths.

The above comments provide more clarity for the H1N1pdm09 situation for the Houston area. An earlier ABC News report cited 6 confirmed fatalities in the Houston area, which included the 3 Harris County cases cited above, and excluded the 4 Conroe cases (see map), which are being retested by the CDC (and results may be reported this weekend).

However, the confirmation of 6 deaths in the Houston area increases the likelihood that the 4 suspect deaths in Conroe will be confirmed. The latest weekly report from Texas (week 50) shows that almost all influenza in Texas is H1N1pdm09 (99% of flu cases are influenza A and 97% of influenza A is H1N1pdm09). The ages of the fatal and severe cases in Conroe (41-68) matches the ages of the fatal cases reported in the 2009/2010 season, when H1N1pdm09 emerged and also dominated (where levels approached 100% by the fall of 2009).The explosion of deaths and severe cases throughout eastern Texas (see map) raises concerns that the 2013/2014 season in the United States will have striking similarities to fall of 2009, when H1N1pdm09 levels peaked and disproportionately affected those under the age of 65.