Treyfish
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<LI class="dateStamp first"><SMALL>SEPTEMBER 23, 2009</SMALL>
By GREGORY L. WHITE
MOSCOW -- A top Russian virologist's charge that health authorities are drastically understating the number of cases of swine flu -- a claim that senior health officials fiercely rejected -- has raised questions about Russia's claims to be relatively unaffected by the pandemic.
The controversy started late Sunday, when state television carried an interview with Dmitry Lvov, head of the government's Institute of Virology, who reported what he said was Russia's first death from H1N1 influenza, saying his institute had tested a sample from the victim.
Dr. Lvov, one of the country's most prominent health specialists, also said there were "tens of thousands" of H1N1 cases in Russia, far more than the 381 the government officially reports.
Top officials have strongly rejected both claims. Public-health chief Gennady Onishchenko accused Dr. Lvov of an "informational terrorist act," according to the official ITAR-Tass news agency. Authorities published detailed information about the death Dr. Lvov referred to, arguing that the patient died of pneumonia and other underlying health conditions, not H1N1.
But the storm has continued, as Dr. Lvov has stuck by his charges and other specialists too have cast doubt on the official figures.
A doctor answering a swine-flu hotline at the state-run Influenza Institute in St. Petersburg this week said, "There have been lethal cases of this flu in Russia. It couldn't be otherwise; we're not isolated from the world." Officially, Russia is one of the few countries left in the world without a single H1N1 death.
The debate has caused an unusual split in the state media, which typically work in lock-step. Dr. Lvov's comments came in a prime-time expos? on the national Rossiya channel that called into question the government's readiness to deal with the pandemic. Tuesday, the official newspaper, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, took the opposite tack, carrying the Health Ministry's denial.
Public suspicion about official transparency of health risks runs deep in Russia, where the former Soviet government frequently covered up major outbreaks. Polls show deep dissatisfaction with the underfunded state-run health system. Poor medical care is cited by international health organizations as a major reason why life expectancy in Russia lags behind levels in Western countries.
In his TV interview, Dr. Lvov accused Dr. Onishchenko's agency of trying to cover up the scale of the outbreak to conceal the failure of their efforts to keep it out of Russia. Dr. Onishchenko rejected those allegations.
In its H1N1-control efforts, Russia has emphasized limiting exposure, measuring the temperatures of airline passengers coming from infected countries and quarantining the sick.
Dr. Onishchenko also has called on Russians not to travel to countries with major outbreaks, including the U.S. and U.K. Earlier this year, his agency banned some pork imports to combat the flu, even though the virus isn't carried by meat. The agency reports daily on the number of airline passengers checked for fever.
Critics have charged that those measures are bound to fail, given the broad spread of the virus, and called for more steps to control domestic transmission and to prepare to treat the sick, such as expanding testing and intensive-care facilities.
"There's no utility in attempting to stop an influenza virus at the border," said Michael Osterholm, a pandemic flu expert who is director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. "It's like trying to keep a submarine intact with screen doors."
Russian officials say they are testing a vaccine and expect to have about 40 million doses by the end of the year, enough to cover about 30% of the population. The Health Ministry this week also reported that locally developed antiviral drugs were more effective, cheaper and safer than foreign ones such as Tamiflu and that production would be ramped up in the coming months.:tiphat:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125366412674432421.html
By GREGORY L. WHITE
MOSCOW -- A top Russian virologist's charge that health authorities are drastically understating the number of cases of swine flu -- a claim that senior health officials fiercely rejected -- has raised questions about Russia's claims to be relatively unaffected by the pandemic.
The controversy started late Sunday, when state television carried an interview with Dmitry Lvov, head of the government's Institute of Virology, who reported what he said was Russia's first death from H1N1 influenza, saying his institute had tested a sample from the victim.
Dr. Lvov, one of the country's most prominent health specialists, also said there were "tens of thousands" of H1N1 cases in Russia, far more than the 381 the government officially reports.
Top officials have strongly rejected both claims. Public-health chief Gennady Onishchenko accused Dr. Lvov of an "informational terrorist act," according to the official ITAR-Tass news agency. Authorities published detailed information about the death Dr. Lvov referred to, arguing that the patient died of pneumonia and other underlying health conditions, not H1N1.
But the storm has continued, as Dr. Lvov has stuck by his charges and other specialists too have cast doubt on the official figures.
A doctor answering a swine-flu hotline at the state-run Influenza Institute in St. Petersburg this week said, "There have been lethal cases of this flu in Russia. It couldn't be otherwise; we're not isolated from the world." Officially, Russia is one of the few countries left in the world without a single H1N1 death.
The debate has caused an unusual split in the state media, which typically work in lock-step. Dr. Lvov's comments came in a prime-time expos? on the national Rossiya channel that called into question the government's readiness to deal with the pandemic. Tuesday, the official newspaper, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, took the opposite tack, carrying the Health Ministry's denial.
Public suspicion about official transparency of health risks runs deep in Russia, where the former Soviet government frequently covered up major outbreaks. Polls show deep dissatisfaction with the underfunded state-run health system. Poor medical care is cited by international health organizations as a major reason why life expectancy in Russia lags behind levels in Western countries.
In his TV interview, Dr. Lvov accused Dr. Onishchenko's agency of trying to cover up the scale of the outbreak to conceal the failure of their efforts to keep it out of Russia. Dr. Onishchenko rejected those allegations.
In its H1N1-control efforts, Russia has emphasized limiting exposure, measuring the temperatures of airline passengers coming from infected countries and quarantining the sick.
Dr. Onishchenko also has called on Russians not to travel to countries with major outbreaks, including the U.S. and U.K. Earlier this year, his agency banned some pork imports to combat the flu, even though the virus isn't carried by meat. The agency reports daily on the number of airline passengers checked for fever.
Critics have charged that those measures are bound to fail, given the broad spread of the virus, and called for more steps to control domestic transmission and to prepare to treat the sick, such as expanding testing and intensive-care facilities.
"There's no utility in attempting to stop an influenza virus at the border," said Michael Osterholm, a pandemic flu expert who is director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. "It's like trying to keep a submarine intact with screen doors."
Russian officials say they are testing a vaccine and expect to have about 40 million doses by the end of the year, enough to cover about 30% of the population. The Health Ministry this week also reported that locally developed antiviral drugs were more effective, cheaper and safer than foreign ones such as Tamiflu and that production would be ramped up in the coming months.:tiphat:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125366412674432421.html