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Emporia Gazette
County records first H1N1 death
By Bobbi Mlynar (Contact)
Saturday, October 24, 2009
A Lyon County man has died from H1N1, health officials announced Friday in a news conference. Officials did not know where the death occurred.
This is the the ninth death in Kansas from H1N1 influenza virus.
The H1N1 virus was confirmed late Thursday afternoon by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment as a contributing factor in the man?s death. The presence of the H1N1 virus in the victim was confirmed on Wednesday.
?The death occurred in a 62-year-old man from northeast Kansas who had underlying health conditions that put him at greater risk for serious complications from the virus,? local health officer Ann Mayo said, reading an excerpt from the KDHE announcement on Friday.
Mayo emphasized that the local man?s death was not cause for panic. Most cases of seasonal flu and H1N1 flu are relatively mild, with the most serious cases generally confined to people with underlying health problems.
?We?re still under the actual number of deaths we would expect from seasonal flu,? Mayo said.
Broad-based testing for flu type on individual patients ended about a month ago, but some tests continue to be taken for the state agency. The local health department is a ?sentinel site? for KDHE, which means that samples taken from flu patients are submitted weekly.
?They are testing two random samples a week,? said Renee Hively, director of public health nursing.
The clinic at Emporia State University and Newman Regional Health also are sentinel sites for the state testing, she said.
Mayo said that tests also are made on anyone who dies after exhibiting flu symptoms. Flu vaccines continue to be in short supply and what is available already is committed to health workers and pregnant women.
Emporia Gazette
County records first H1N1 death
By Bobbi Mlynar (Contact)
Saturday, October 24, 2009
A Lyon County man has died from H1N1, health officials announced Friday in a news conference. Officials did not know where the death occurred.
This is the the ninth death in Kansas from H1N1 influenza virus.
The H1N1 virus was confirmed late Thursday afternoon by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment as a contributing factor in the man?s death. The presence of the H1N1 virus in the victim was confirmed on Wednesday.
?The death occurred in a 62-year-old man from northeast Kansas who had underlying health conditions that put him at greater risk for serious complications from the virus,? local health officer Ann Mayo said, reading an excerpt from the KDHE announcement on Friday.
Mayo emphasized that the local man?s death was not cause for panic. Most cases of seasonal flu and H1N1 flu are relatively mild, with the most serious cases generally confined to people with underlying health problems.
?We?re still under the actual number of deaths we would expect from seasonal flu,? Mayo said.
Broad-based testing for flu type on individual patients ended about a month ago, but some tests continue to be taken for the state agency. The local health department is a ?sentinel site? for KDHE, which means that samples taken from flu patients are submitted weekly.
?They are testing two random samples a week,? said Renee Hively, director of public health nursing.
The clinic at Emporia State University and Newman Regional Health also are sentinel sites for the state testing, she said.
Mayo said that tests also are made on anyone who dies after exhibiting flu symptoms. Flu vaccines continue to be in short supply and what is available already is committed to health workers and pregnant women.