The Lebanese Ministry of Health has decided to abandon its H1N1 tally:
Keeping a count ‘is useless and it is very expensive to test 3 million people for A(H1N1), especially since the tests will not prevent the virus from spreading,’ Mohammad Jawad Khalifeh, minister of health said.
So basically instead of providing the public with up-to-date information on the virus in Lebanon, just go on with your lives. Why trouble yourself with a worry that the person sitting next to you might be infected with the virus? I mean, early testing and early prevention is for retards. Its best we just stick our heads into ground and hope for the best.
Medical students at AUB seem to suggest the main issue with Lebanon’s Swine Flu Management is communication:
Student Akl Fahed, presenting the group’s recent study, said: “We cannot say whether we are prepared or not, but we can say where the gaps are and obviously there are gaps; mainly in communication at the lower levels, the people who need to relay information to the people who need to know.”
The issue is that pharmacists are giving Tamiflu without prescriptions and many doctors are sending anyone with a slight cough to government hospitals to get tested for H1N1. In effect, poor communication with the front-line medical community on what to look for and what to do.
And now the Ministry has decided to reduce communication with the community at large?!?
The H1N1 vaccine will be mandatory for uniformed personnel and health workers.
Any fatalities in Lebanon yet? Quite a few here in Israel. I wonder what this winter will be like… Scary, really.
It is. I believe there were fatalities due to other underlying illnesses and not a direct cause from the flu. But the numbers (before they stopped counting) seemed to be growing.
This is not something new. In fact Canada stopped counting cases in July, and even WHO asked for that.
http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2009/07/17/who-swine-flu-counting.html
It seems that most of the people who died from swine flu had already respiratory diseases or other illnesses. The two cases in Lebanon were like that, just like the couple of cases here in Canada.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/09/health/09flu.html
As for pharmacists giving Tamiflu without prescriptions, lol this is funny. Last month, a female from Hong Kong started taking Tamiflu without being infected with swine flu, but when she got infected, the virus mutated and became resistant to Tamiflu lol.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iLqfI0eBi7UdViE7VkA4wNqS8obQ
Thanks for the links.
Health ministry of lebanon wouldnt die if he gives facemasks would he?(no i dont think so…) the virus may spread more and more,,lets take a example of UK they have over2million of facemasks plus their health ministry frobided them from going outside the house!
I’m quite skeptical on the country’s ability to handle an epidemic. Honestly, if tens of hundreds came down sick with H1N1, I don’t think the present health system would be able to handle it – I wouldn’t be surprised if the private hospitals turned people away because they don’t have any money.