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Source: http://www.thetimes-tribune.com/new...s-and-healthy-then-dead-of-swine-flu-1.498283
Vigorous and healthy, then dead of swine flu
By Don Sapatkin (The Philadelphia Inquirer)
Published: December 19, 2009
Bonnie Weller / the Philadelphia Inquirer Mickey Hirsch holds a poster of his son Kevin.
Bonnie Weller / the Philadelphia Inquirer Mickey Hirsch puts up posters of his son Kevin on Welsh Road in Philadelphia on Dec. 7. Mr. Hirsch was urging residents to get vaccinated against the H1N1 flu strain. Kevin, 26, died of swine flu last month.
PHILADELPHIA - Laura Brewster, healthy and fit at 56, ran, swam and played tennis. Three weeks ago, she returned to her suburban home from a dream vacation in China. Less than a week later, she was dead of swine flu.
Kevin Hirsch, 26, almost never missed a day of work at a McDonald's restaurant in Northeast Philadelphia. "He didn't have a runny nose, a cold or a fever in 15 years," said his father, Mickey, who disconnected his son's life support on Nov. 18 after nearly 15 agonizing days in the ICU.
For months, public health authorities have emphasized the dangers of swine flu for people with specific medical conditions. Such patients account for between 60 and 80 percent of hospitalizations and deaths.
But 20 to 40 percent do not fit that profile. Some may have gotten medical care too late. Some may have had underlying conditions not known to them or their doctors, or factors, such as a genetic predisposition, that science has yet to discover. Others may simply have lost out in the roll of the dice, like the nonsmoker who dies of lung cancer.
As a society, we tend to think everything has a clear cause, said epidemiologist Dr. Laurie Kamimoto, who leads the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's surveillance of influenza hospitalization.
"I don't think people cozy up to the idea that it (may be) just bad luck," she said.
Scientists worldwide are trying to determine who is most at risk from novel H1N1 influenza. Children were identified early on. The biggest risk factors for seasonal flu - pulmonary, heart and metabolic diseases (such as diabetes), and immune systems that are suppressed (by drugs for cancer and diseases such as HIV) - do raise the risk of complications from swine flu.
Pregnancy, another known risk, appears to be an even greater factor in this pandemic. Hypertension, a history of smoking and obesity also may make people more vulnerable.
Morbidly obese people, currently 5 percent of the U.S. population, were hospitalized at five times the expected rate, Dr. Kamimoto and colleagues reported in the New England Journal of Medicine last month. Most had other chronic conditions, however, so the reasons are unclear.
Ms. Brewster, the middle-aged suburban woman, and Mr. Hirsch, the young man from the city, each had a slight brush with possible new risk factors: She smoked one or two cigarettes a day before quitting last year. He, at 5 foot 4 and 180 pounds, qualified as obese.
In interviews, however, their doctors and families described them as unusually healthy and at no particular risk of complications. They were not members of any group given priority for immunization, and they did not get vaccinated.
In the weeks since Kevin Hirsch's death, Mickey Hirsch has turned grief into action.
The single father of three is on a whirlwind campaign for vaccination, tacking more than 100 homemade posters around his Northeast Philadelphia neighborhood and corresponding with thousands of people on the "Prayers for Kevin Hirsch" Facebook page set up during his son's illness.
For those who are uncertain, he offers support, personally escorting dozens to get vaccinated at a nearby city health clinic.
And for those who question the worth or safety of vaccines, he is blunt: "They should be thankful that their parents didn't feel the same way when it came time to get the polio vaccine."
Vigorous and healthy, then dead of swine flu
By Don Sapatkin (The Philadelphia Inquirer)
Published: December 19, 2009
Bonnie Weller / the Philadelphia Inquirer Mickey Hirsch holds a poster of his son Kevin.
Bonnie Weller / the Philadelphia Inquirer Mickey Hirsch puts up posters of his son Kevin on Welsh Road in Philadelphia on Dec. 7. Mr. Hirsch was urging residents to get vaccinated against the H1N1 flu strain. Kevin, 26, died of swine flu last month.
PHILADELPHIA - Laura Brewster, healthy and fit at 56, ran, swam and played tennis. Three weeks ago, she returned to her suburban home from a dream vacation in China. Less than a week later, she was dead of swine flu.
Kevin Hirsch, 26, almost never missed a day of work at a McDonald's restaurant in Northeast Philadelphia. "He didn't have a runny nose, a cold or a fever in 15 years," said his father, Mickey, who disconnected his son's life support on Nov. 18 after nearly 15 agonizing days in the ICU.
For months, public health authorities have emphasized the dangers of swine flu for people with specific medical conditions. Such patients account for between 60 and 80 percent of hospitalizations and deaths.
But 20 to 40 percent do not fit that profile. Some may have gotten medical care too late. Some may have had underlying conditions not known to them or their doctors, or factors, such as a genetic predisposition, that science has yet to discover. Others may simply have lost out in the roll of the dice, like the nonsmoker who dies of lung cancer.
As a society, we tend to think everything has a clear cause, said epidemiologist Dr. Laurie Kamimoto, who leads the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's surveillance of influenza hospitalization.
"I don't think people cozy up to the idea that it (may be) just bad luck," she said.
Scientists worldwide are trying to determine who is most at risk from novel H1N1 influenza. Children were identified early on. The biggest risk factors for seasonal flu - pulmonary, heart and metabolic diseases (such as diabetes), and immune systems that are suppressed (by drugs for cancer and diseases such as HIV) - do raise the risk of complications from swine flu.
Pregnancy, another known risk, appears to be an even greater factor in this pandemic. Hypertension, a history of smoking and obesity also may make people more vulnerable.
Morbidly obese people, currently 5 percent of the U.S. population, were hospitalized at five times the expected rate, Dr. Kamimoto and colleagues reported in the New England Journal of Medicine last month. Most had other chronic conditions, however, so the reasons are unclear.
Ms. Brewster, the middle-aged suburban woman, and Mr. Hirsch, the young man from the city, each had a slight brush with possible new risk factors: She smoked one or two cigarettes a day before quitting last year. He, at 5 foot 4 and 180 pounds, qualified as obese.
In interviews, however, their doctors and families described them as unusually healthy and at no particular risk of complications. They were not members of any group given priority for immunization, and they did not get vaccinated.
In the weeks since Kevin Hirsch's death, Mickey Hirsch has turned grief into action.
The single father of three is on a whirlwind campaign for vaccination, tacking more than 100 homemade posters around his Northeast Philadelphia neighborhood and corresponding with thousands of people on the "Prayers for Kevin Hirsch" Facebook page set up during his son's illness.
For those who are uncertain, he offers support, personally escorting dozens to get vaccinated at a nearby city health clinic.
And for those who question the worth or safety of vaccines, he is blunt: "They should be thankful that their parents didn't feel the same way when it came time to get the polio vaccine."