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Three new New York deaths
- Thread starter wotan
- Start date
Re: Three new New York deaths
And then there were 3 more deaths reported today (June 11) in NYC - this article gives a bit of background to the one young girl who has died - I have a daughter in 6th grade too....
New Victims of Swine Flu Include 11-Year-Old
by JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ
Published: June 11, 2009
An 11-year-old girl who attended a Brooklyn school has died after becoming infected with the swine flu virus, classmates and school officials said on Thursday.
The death, which occurred this week, was the first of a public school student in New York City and one of three new flu deaths that city health officials announced on Thursday.
The girl, whose name was not released, was in the sixth grade at the Urban Assembly School for Criminal Justice, which shares a building with Intermediate School 223 in Borough Park. Students were seen carrying letters home announcing the death and advising parents to keep their children in class. An evening play at the school was canceled.
?I?m scared,? said Brenda Barranco, 12, who was leaving school early because she felt sick and was coughing. But attendance has been relatively normal at both the Urban Assembly School and I.S. 223 in recent days, according to the Department of Education.
Two 13-year-old girls who knew the student who died said that she enjoyed giving hugs and was ?very joyful and playful.?
They said that when they last saw her about a week ago she was coughing and complaining of stomach pain. She was overweight, the girls said ? a factor that can make people vulnerable to the virus, health experts have said.
The other two new deaths were of a child younger than 2, the second death of a child that young, and a person older than 30, the health department said.
City health officials continued to face questions over their handling of the spread of swine flu, which has killed at least 15 people in the city.
At a City Council hearing on the issue on Thursday, council members said that the city had been slow to provide information about the illness and that its decisions to close schools seemed arbitrary.
Councilman Peter F. Vallone Jr. of Queens said the public should be told if those who die after contracting the virus have pre-existing illnesses. Health officials have said that virtually all of those who have died had a condition that made them more susceptible to the flu.
But the officials have not specified those conditions, and the list of high-risk factors is so long ? including heart disease, obesity and being older than 65 ? that as many as one in three New Yorkers may have at least one.
?Why is the information about the people who have succumbed to this flu being kept secret?? Mr. Vallone asked.
The new health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley, defended the city?s reluctance to divulge details about people who have come down with the virus.
?We have to separate what?s important for people to know and plan versus privacy,? Dr. Farley said. ?Specific medical information about individual patients will not change how an individual or an organization responds.?
Council members also expressed concern about the increase in visits to emergency rooms last month. Health officials said the number of visits appeared to be declining, but the department would continue to monitor the data.
Dr. Farley said increased federal funding would be crucial as the city prepared for the next flu season and the possibility that a more severe strain of the virus would develop. Flu seasons typically begin in the fall and peak in the winter.
As of Thursday, city officials estimated that swine flu had spread rapidly, affecting more than half a million people.
But since the beginning of the outbreak, only 567 New Yorkers have been hospitalized with swine flu.
City officials suggested that the low rate of hospitalization indicated how mild the strain of virus had been.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/nyregion/12student.html?hpw
And then there were 3 more deaths reported today (June 11) in NYC - this article gives a bit of background to the one young girl who has died - I have a daughter in 6th grade too....
New Victims of Swine Flu Include 11-Year-Old
by JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ
Published: June 11, 2009
An 11-year-old girl who attended a Brooklyn school has died after becoming infected with the swine flu virus, classmates and school officials said on Thursday.
The death, which occurred this week, was the first of a public school student in New York City and one of three new flu deaths that city health officials announced on Thursday.
The girl, whose name was not released, was in the sixth grade at the Urban Assembly School for Criminal Justice, which shares a building with Intermediate School 223 in Borough Park. Students were seen carrying letters home announcing the death and advising parents to keep their children in class. An evening play at the school was canceled.
?I?m scared,? said Brenda Barranco, 12, who was leaving school early because she felt sick and was coughing. But attendance has been relatively normal at both the Urban Assembly School and I.S. 223 in recent days, according to the Department of Education.
Two 13-year-old girls who knew the student who died said that she enjoyed giving hugs and was ?very joyful and playful.?
They said that when they last saw her about a week ago she was coughing and complaining of stomach pain. She was overweight, the girls said ? a factor that can make people vulnerable to the virus, health experts have said.
The other two new deaths were of a child younger than 2, the second death of a child that young, and a person older than 30, the health department said.
City health officials continued to face questions over their handling of the spread of swine flu, which has killed at least 15 people in the city.
At a City Council hearing on the issue on Thursday, council members said that the city had been slow to provide information about the illness and that its decisions to close schools seemed arbitrary.
Councilman Peter F. Vallone Jr. of Queens said the public should be told if those who die after contracting the virus have pre-existing illnesses. Health officials have said that virtually all of those who have died had a condition that made them more susceptible to the flu.
But the officials have not specified those conditions, and the list of high-risk factors is so long ? including heart disease, obesity and being older than 65 ? that as many as one in three New Yorkers may have at least one.
?Why is the information about the people who have succumbed to this flu being kept secret?? Mr. Vallone asked.
The new health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley, defended the city?s reluctance to divulge details about people who have come down with the virus.
?We have to separate what?s important for people to know and plan versus privacy,? Dr. Farley said. ?Specific medical information about individual patients will not change how an individual or an organization responds.?
Council members also expressed concern about the increase in visits to emergency rooms last month. Health officials said the number of visits appeared to be declining, but the department would continue to monitor the data.
Dr. Farley said increased federal funding would be crucial as the city prepared for the next flu season and the possibility that a more severe strain of the virus would develop. Flu seasons typically begin in the fall and peak in the winter.
As of Thursday, city officials estimated that swine flu had spread rapidly, affecting more than half a million people.
But since the beginning of the outbreak, only 567 New Yorkers have been hospitalized with swine flu.
City officials suggested that the low rate of hospitalization indicated how mild the strain of virus had been.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/nyregion/12student.html?hpw
Re: Three new New York deaths
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stor...dent-among-confirmed-h1n1-deaths/Default.aspx
Brooklyn Student Among Confirmed H1N1 Deaths
By: NY1 News
Health officials were at a Brooklyn junior high school Friday to answer questions and allay the concerns of students and parents, a day after it was confirmed that a student there died of the H1N1 virus.
According to students and parents, the girl, 11-year-old Sara Michel, was a sixth grader at I.S. 609, the Urban Assembly School of Criminal Justice in Borough Park.
Friends say she was a great girl who loved to cook.
"She wanted to be a chef. That was her dream," said a friend.
"It was very hard. She was a good friend," said another.
The girl, according to students and reports, had a heart defect.
"We understand that the student had some kind of complications, but it just reinforces the message that if there's an underlying issue or illness, you have to get treatment immediately," said United Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten.
While both I.S. 609 and I.S. 223, which share a building with the all-girls school, remained open today, school officials were joined by a Department of Health doctor to meet with parents of students at the schools.
More than a dozen parents attended, many learning of the meeting on the morning news. Some questioned why both schools remained open.
"There's a death in the school and the doors are still open?" asked one parent.
"They're saying everything is okay, but it [doesn?t satisfy me]," said another.
Department of Education records show last week's attendance at the school, before and after Sarah Michel was sent home sick, according to her friends, was high, at roughly 87 percent. At the peak of flu concerns in May, more than 40 schools had been closed, many due to a rapid drop in attendance.
The building was cleaned by custodians last night, said a janitor who works in the building. Custodians say everything from watercoolers to door handles have been sanitized.
Counselors have been brought in to help the students cope.
The girl's death was one of three announced by the city yesterday; another death was announced today ? bringing the total number of H1N1 related deaths in the city to 16.
The latest death occurred in a person between the ages of 40 and 49.
According to the DOH, 12 of the deceased had established underlying risk factors for developing severe flu or complications from the flu. Of the 567 hospitalizations, 80 percent had at least one known risk factor.
The Department of Health also said today that the overall number of emergency department visits for H1N1 are declining.
?While every hospitalization is concerning and every death is a tragedy, our surveillance data indicate that the number of people newly infected is declining," said Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley in a statement on Friday.
The city said yesterday that fighting the flu outbreak has cost $10 million.
The World Health Organization has declared the virus a pandemic.
CDC Director and former City Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden said that does not mean the virus is becoming more severe, just that it is spreading to more parts of the world.
Meanwhile, an exclusive NY1, New York Times, Cornell University poll finds that the majority of New Yorkers are worried about contracting the H1N1 flu.
In a telephone poll, more than six in 10 say they're concerned they or someone in their household will come down with the flu strain.
But residents are giving the city high marks for its handling of the outbreak; 70 percent of the respondents say the city did a good job dealing with the outbreak.
About a quarter of those polled say they were not satisfied with the way the city responded to the flu.
And more than two-thirds say the city has done a good job providing details on the flu.
"If you teach your children to wash their hands, it's perfect, that's it," said one New Yorker. "You just have to practice clean habits."
"It seems like they close the schools when they need to be closed, when there is threat that there is illness," said another. "It seems like it's been handled pretty well as far as I know."
"The city's reaction to it I think was very positive as far as their notification and their coverage of it," said a third.
There were 683 city residents who participated in the survey. The margin of error is plus or minus four percentage points.
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stor...dent-among-confirmed-h1n1-deaths/Default.aspx
Brooklyn Student Among Confirmed H1N1 Deaths
By: NY1 News
Health officials were at a Brooklyn junior high school Friday to answer questions and allay the concerns of students and parents, a day after it was confirmed that a student there died of the H1N1 virus.
According to students and parents, the girl, 11-year-old Sara Michel, was a sixth grader at I.S. 609, the Urban Assembly School of Criminal Justice in Borough Park.
Friends say she was a great girl who loved to cook.
"She wanted to be a chef. That was her dream," said a friend.
"It was very hard. She was a good friend," said another.
The girl, according to students and reports, had a heart defect.
"We understand that the student had some kind of complications, but it just reinforces the message that if there's an underlying issue or illness, you have to get treatment immediately," said United Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten.
While both I.S. 609 and I.S. 223, which share a building with the all-girls school, remained open today, school officials were joined by a Department of Health doctor to meet with parents of students at the schools.
More than a dozen parents attended, many learning of the meeting on the morning news. Some questioned why both schools remained open.
"There's a death in the school and the doors are still open?" asked one parent.
"They're saying everything is okay, but it [doesn?t satisfy me]," said another.
Department of Education records show last week's attendance at the school, before and after Sarah Michel was sent home sick, according to her friends, was high, at roughly 87 percent. At the peak of flu concerns in May, more than 40 schools had been closed, many due to a rapid drop in attendance.
The building was cleaned by custodians last night, said a janitor who works in the building. Custodians say everything from watercoolers to door handles have been sanitized.
Counselors have been brought in to help the students cope.
The girl's death was one of three announced by the city yesterday; another death was announced today ? bringing the total number of H1N1 related deaths in the city to 16.
The latest death occurred in a person between the ages of 40 and 49.
According to the DOH, 12 of the deceased had established underlying risk factors for developing severe flu or complications from the flu. Of the 567 hospitalizations, 80 percent had at least one known risk factor.
The Department of Health also said today that the overall number of emergency department visits for H1N1 are declining.
?While every hospitalization is concerning and every death is a tragedy, our surveillance data indicate that the number of people newly infected is declining," said Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Farley in a statement on Friday.
The city said yesterday that fighting the flu outbreak has cost $10 million.
The World Health Organization has declared the virus a pandemic.
CDC Director and former City Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden said that does not mean the virus is becoming more severe, just that it is spreading to more parts of the world.
Meanwhile, an exclusive NY1, New York Times, Cornell University poll finds that the majority of New Yorkers are worried about contracting the H1N1 flu.
In a telephone poll, more than six in 10 say they're concerned they or someone in their household will come down with the flu strain.
But residents are giving the city high marks for its handling of the outbreak; 70 percent of the respondents say the city did a good job dealing with the outbreak.
About a quarter of those polled say they were not satisfied with the way the city responded to the flu.
And more than two-thirds say the city has done a good job providing details on the flu.
"If you teach your children to wash their hands, it's perfect, that's it," said one New Yorker. "You just have to practice clean habits."
"It seems like they close the schools when they need to be closed, when there is threat that there is illness," said another. "It seems like it's been handled pretty well as far as I know."
"The city's reaction to it I think was very positive as far as their notification and their coverage of it," said a third.
There were 683 city residents who participated in the survey. The margin of error is plus or minus four percentage points.