Helen BranswellVerified account

@HelenBranswell

Senior writer, infectious diseases & global health, . I block rude. , , . Neiman '11. 🇨🇦 No tagging, please.

Boston, MA
Joined April 2009

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  1. Retweeted
    16 hours ago

    Not shocked, but still. Big deal in answer to big problems in .

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  2. PS: I hit send & boom! Today's update hit my mailbox. +4 cases today, +1 death. Totals are now 613 cases & 371 deaths.

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  3. 6. A lot of transmission has happened in health-care settings. A study in Komanda found confidence in hospitals is waning & people are eschewing them, says. Rumors about the vaccine & safe burials are also undermining response work.

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  4. 5. There are data about infections in health care workers, but frankly, they confuse me. The WHO DON says there have been 55 HCW cases, 18 of whom have died. But it looks like they don't know the outcomes of 5 others. Still in care?

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  5. 4. Another horrible figure: 29 of the cases to date have been pregnant women. Pregnant women aren't eligible to get the experimental vaccine. Women make up a disproportion segment of the cases in this outbreak.

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  6. 3. Financial costs pale beside the human costs of , however. This one remains very tough on children. They make up a lot of the cases — 16% are children under age 5. Lots have been orphaned or separated from family during this outbreak — nearly 500 to date.

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  7. 2. Where to start? How about costs? The cost of fighting this outbreak has been revised upwards to nearly US$130 million until the end of January. And there's zero hope the outbreak will be extinguished by then.

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  8. Today's update from hasn't come in, but issued a new Disease Outbreak News report & issued a new situation report, so I've got some Ebola material to share. Apologies in advance for the length of this thread.

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  9. need to be *taking* sigh.

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  10. There'll be more of these suspected cases going forward; in fact they are popping up in African countries regularly. Hospitals everywhere need to be take travel histories & think & test for when relevant. We in the media need to word coverage of them carefully.

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  11. The Swedish man who was tested for today does NOT have the disease. Mikael Köhler, chief medical officer for the hospital where he was tested, said the man was tested for several types of Ebola & Marburg. "All tests are negative."

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  12. Retweeted

    As the gov't shutdown drags on, domestic violence shelters struggle to find the $$ to stay open.

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  13. Retweeted
    23 hours ago
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  14. 4. Flu activity is widespread now in 24 states + Guam. Last week that figure was 11 (map on left). This map will fill in with brown over the next few weeks. Cover your coughs, folks, & if you are sick & work somewhere that gives you paid sick leave, stay home.

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  15. 3. The vast majority of infections so far this year are being caused by A viruses, primarily . In the southeastern part of the US, however, viruses are dominant. B activity is low right now but it commonly surges when A viruses wane.

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  16. 2. activity is really picking up, as you can see from the red line in the graphs below. The week ending Dec. 22 is on the left; on the right is the most recent week's data, to Dec. 29.

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  17. U.S. thread: 2 more children have died from influenza this season, bringing the death toll among kids to 13. Flu is dangerous for children, folks.

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  18. Jan 4

    Scientists used rapid, in-the-field genome testing to allay fears about an unusual surge of Lassa fever cases in Nigeria last year. Is same being done yet in DRC's outbreak? I know wanted to use this tool.

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  19. Jan 4

    . says the U.S. is taking unmerited heat for not sending government employees to DRC's zone, saying many other countries aren't either. A question, Tweet folk: Which countries have publicly said no?

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  20. Jan 4

    There was a single case reported yesterday & 2 deaths, bringing the case counts to 609 cases & 370 deaths. Yesterday's numbers didn't come out till this morning. The count will rise again later today, to 613, the Ebola dashboard suggests.

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