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First Flu Fatality Was Diabetic, Mother of Three, Census Worker
2009-05-01 04:25:59.727 GMT
(For stories about swine flu, see {EXT3 <GO>}. For a global
toll, {ALLX H1N1 <GO>}.)
By Andres R. Martinez
May 1 (Bloomberg) -- Adela Maria Gutierrez, a 38-year-old
census worker who loved her job, her family and dancing the
cumbia, complained of a sore throat on April 4 and died in a
hospital bed less than two weeks later. She became the first
fatality from swine flu in Mexico, the country hardest hit by
the widening outbreak.
A doctor with the state of Oaxaca's Investigative
Epidemiology unit, who declined to be named, confirmed the
woman's identity yesterday in a telephone interview. Previously,
Mexico's director of the National Center for Epidemiology
Control, Miguel Angel Lezana, had said that the first victim was
a Oaxaca woman with three daughters, who worked as a census
collector and suffered from diabetes. A spokesman at Mexico's
health ministry in Mexico City declined to comment yesterday.
Gutierrez's husband, Jose Luis Ramirez, 38, said in an
interview at his home that his wife, a diabetic, first
complained of fatigue on April 1. Three days later, she
developed a sore throat and saw a doctor, who prescribed an
antibiotic, he said.
?She complained of pains in her ribs and not being able to
sleep, but she wanted to wait until the next day to see a
doctor,? he said. ?She was so responsible; she didn't want to
miss any work.?
By April 9, she was in the hospital, her toes and fingers
blue, Ramirez said. Doctors told Gutierrez she needed oxygen and
had to be transferred to another unit, he said. The doctors
worried that moving her would make her worse, so they kept her
there, he said.
Holding Hands
The doctor isolated her from the other patients on April
12, the last day Ramirez saw his wife. He held her hand and
stroked her face, talking to her about the house they planned to
buy in the coming months. ?I took care of her, held her,? he
said. ?All I could think was, what's going to happen to us??
The next day, she was dead. Doctors told Ramirez she had
died from a new form of influenza, and that he and his family
needed to be quarantined.
?I woke up the next morning shaking from what they had told
me,? Ramirez said, seated in his living room, his hands folded
on a yellowed Bible open to Psalm 128. ?Every time someone
sneezed I panicked.?
Oaxaca's health minister, Martin Vasquez Villanueva,
visited his home, as did doctors who checked the family for flu
symptoms, Ramirez said.
Corner Store
?None of us has gotten sick. It can't have originated here
then,? he said.
They all live together in the two-story house, attached to
a corner store selling candy, school supplies and Coca-Cola in
the Santa Lucia neighborhood. Ramirez's mother runs the store.
Mexican officials said 159 people may have died from the
malady, with 97 cases and at least seven deaths confirmed by the
World Health Organization. The new strain of flu has been
confirmed in only 257 people worldwide yet threatens millions,
according to the organization. Confirmed cases are now reported
in 11 countries, and officials in New York, Mexico and Australia
have said hundreds more infections are suspected.
A ?worrisome sign from Mexico was the relatively young
healthy adults? succumbing to the virus, Anne Schuchat, interim
deputy director of the CDC science and public health program,
said yesterday in Congress. She said the average age of those in
the U.S. confirmed to have the flu is 22.
Veracruz Case
Mexico's health minister Jose Cordova has said that the
first confirmed case of swine flu in Mexico was a 5-year-old boy
in La Gloria, Veracruz, who later recovered. Gutierrez is the
only confirmed fatality in the state of Oaxaca.
On a busy city street in Oaxaca, Maribel Cruz, 33, wearing
a blue face mask, said she won't be making her weekly trip to
the movies because she's concerned about catching the swine-flu
virus.
?I am really worried, especially since most people here
aren't following health guidelines,? she said, as she pointed to
the shoe-shiners, food vendors and balloon hawkers whose faces
were unprotected.
First Flu Fatality Was Diabetic, Mother of Three, Census Worker
2009-05-01 04:25:59.727 GMT
(For stories about swine flu, see {EXT3 <GO>}. For a global
toll, {ALLX H1N1 <GO>}.)
By Andres R. Martinez
May 1 (Bloomberg) -- Adela Maria Gutierrez, a 38-year-old
census worker who loved her job, her family and dancing the
cumbia, complained of a sore throat on April 4 and died in a
hospital bed less than two weeks later. She became the first
fatality from swine flu in Mexico, the country hardest hit by
the widening outbreak.
A doctor with the state of Oaxaca's Investigative
Epidemiology unit, who declined to be named, confirmed the
woman's identity yesterday in a telephone interview. Previously,
Mexico's director of the National Center for Epidemiology
Control, Miguel Angel Lezana, had said that the first victim was
a Oaxaca woman with three daughters, who worked as a census
collector and suffered from diabetes. A spokesman at Mexico's
health ministry in Mexico City declined to comment yesterday.
Gutierrez's husband, Jose Luis Ramirez, 38, said in an
interview at his home that his wife, a diabetic, first
complained of fatigue on April 1. Three days later, she
developed a sore throat and saw a doctor, who prescribed an
antibiotic, he said.
?She complained of pains in her ribs and not being able to
sleep, but she wanted to wait until the next day to see a
doctor,? he said. ?She was so responsible; she didn't want to
miss any work.?
By April 9, she was in the hospital, her toes and fingers
blue, Ramirez said. Doctors told Gutierrez she needed oxygen and
had to be transferred to another unit, he said. The doctors
worried that moving her would make her worse, so they kept her
there, he said.
Holding Hands
The doctor isolated her from the other patients on April
12, the last day Ramirez saw his wife. He held her hand and
stroked her face, talking to her about the house they planned to
buy in the coming months. ?I took care of her, held her,? he
said. ?All I could think was, what's going to happen to us??
The next day, she was dead. Doctors told Ramirez she had
died from a new form of influenza, and that he and his family
needed to be quarantined.
?I woke up the next morning shaking from what they had told
me,? Ramirez said, seated in his living room, his hands folded
on a yellowed Bible open to Psalm 128. ?Every time someone
sneezed I panicked.?
Oaxaca's health minister, Martin Vasquez Villanueva,
visited his home, as did doctors who checked the family for flu
symptoms, Ramirez said.
Corner Store
?None of us has gotten sick. It can't have originated here
then,? he said.
They all live together in the two-story house, attached to
a corner store selling candy, school supplies and Coca-Cola in
the Santa Lucia neighborhood. Ramirez's mother runs the store.
Mexican officials said 159 people may have died from the
malady, with 97 cases and at least seven deaths confirmed by the
World Health Organization. The new strain of flu has been
confirmed in only 257 people worldwide yet threatens millions,
according to the organization. Confirmed cases are now reported
in 11 countries, and officials in New York, Mexico and Australia
have said hundreds more infections are suspected.
A ?worrisome sign from Mexico was the relatively young
healthy adults? succumbing to the virus, Anne Schuchat, interim
deputy director of the CDC science and public health program,
said yesterday in Congress. She said the average age of those in
the U.S. confirmed to have the flu is 22.
Veracruz Case
Mexico's health minister Jose Cordova has said that the
first confirmed case of swine flu in Mexico was a 5-year-old boy
in La Gloria, Veracruz, who later recovered. Gutierrez is the
only confirmed fatality in the state of Oaxaca.
On a busy city street in Oaxaca, Maribel Cruz, 33, wearing
a blue face mask, said she won't be making her weekly trip to
the movies because she's concerned about catching the swine-flu
virus.
?I am really worried, especially since most people here
aren't following health guidelines,? she said, as she pointed to
the shoe-shiners, food vendors and balloon hawkers whose faces
were unprotected.