Dr
Brian Smyth from the Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre,
was the guest speaker at our January meeting speaking about
Flu Surveillance a subject which he is very passionate about.
The Communicable Surveillance Centre based at the Belfast
City Hospital was set up 10 years ago. The Hill Medical Group
was one of the first practices to help the surveillance team.
Dr Smyth went on to explain about flu that it is caused
by a virus, there being three types of the virus A quite
nasty B not as bad & C trivial. The type of flu in Northern
Ireland at the moment was type A. Symptoms of full blown
flu are aches and pains high temperature, cough runny nose
and feeling dreadful; which can last up to seven days. Nothing
can be done other that go to bed, take paracetamol and drink
fluids. Droplets from sneezes and coughs spread flu, hand
hygiene is very important.
Information about flu is gathered through different sources
i.e. schools, work places with sick certificates, pharmacies
with over the counter remedies, GP spotter practices like
The Hill, through out of hours centres, hospital admission
increases and even through death certificates from the Registrar
General. The types of information that is needed from these
sources are when did the flu season start and when its going
to peak, what age group is affected, what sort of virus
A B or C and how does that virus compare with the season
vaccine that is circulating. This information is then passed
to the trusts so they can prepare for more admissions, Department
of Health to GP surgeries and out of hour and also to the
European Influenza Scheme. All this information is available
to the public through the infectious disease website.
There are 29 spotter practices in the province, who submit
the information to the infectious disease unit on a weekly
basis, information gathered from house calls, surgery and
telephone consultations. There were three hundred thousand
people vaccinated in Northern Ireland and 10% of those at
risk refuse to have it. Dr Smyth commended the GP surgeries
for their hard work during the flu campaign administrating
so many vaccines.
A pandemic flu is like a fast flood it comes with no warning,
sweeps everything in its way and leaves massive devastation.
There have been three types of pandemic flu in the last
century. Spanish flu in 1918 with 40 million deaths worldwide,
the Asian flu in 1957 killing 1 million people and in 1968
the Hong Kong flu leaving 1 million dead world wide.