An elementary school child from central Maine died last week from the flu, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday.
The child was healthy before getting sick with influenza symptoms and had no underlying medical problems, said Dr. Sheila Pinette, director of the Maine CDC.
“Our hearts go out to the family and the school and the community that had to suffer this tragedy,” she said.
Pinette declined to release the child’s age or hometown. The child’s official residence remained unclear, she said.
The death marks the first pediatric flu fatality in Maine this season. The last time influenza claimed the life of a child in the state was during the 2010-2011 flu season, when a vaccinated child from York County died.
Influenza deaths among children, which must be reported to public health officials, are rare, according to Pinette.
“Flu is often seen as a disease that takes the life of the elderly and frail, but children are also vulnerable,” she said.
Maine CDC hasn’t yet recorded any flu deaths among adults this season, Pinette said. Public health officials recommend but don’t require that health providers report those deaths.
“We don’t always know or hear about it,” Pinette said.
In announcing the child’s death, Maine CDC urged those who haven’t yet been vaccinated against the flu to get their annual flu shot. Health officials encourage everyone over 6 months of age to be vaccinated against the illness, including those who were immunized last year.
The vaccine, available as both a shot and a nasal spray, takes full effect about two weeks after it is administered, but offers some protection right away.
How well the vaccine protects against influenza varies from season to season and can depend on the individual. The vaccine is reformulated each year to match emerging strains of the illness.
Three strains of the flu are circulating nationally. The flu vaccine is likely to offer good protection against all of them, according to health officials.
The central Maine child who died was sicked with influenza A H3N2, a strain that’s “coming on a little stronger and a little faster and earlier than we anticipated,” Pinette said. She said she did not believe the child had been vaccinated against the flu.
Several other local children also became ill but experienced less severe symptoms, she said.
Plenty of vaccine is available this season, Pinette said. Flu vaccines are available at most health care provider offices and most pharmacies.
The flu season that started this fall is shaping up to be worse than the last, with more outbreaks reported in Maine so far than during all of the prior season, she said.
Maine CDC confirmed the season’s first cases of the flu in late October.
The illness’ spread typically peaks in January and February but can continue into May.
Every year, up to 20 percent of Americans will get the flu, according to the U.S. CDC. On average, more than 200,000 people are hospitalized for influenza-related complications. People at high risk for developing flu-related complications include children younger than age 5, adults aged 65 and older, pregnant women, American Indians, Alaska natives, people with underlying medical conditions and the morbidly obese.
Symptoms of influenza include fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, muscle or body aches, headaches and fatigue.
“Anyone with these symptoms should follow the No Flu 4 You guidelines,” Pinette said. “This includes hand washing, good respiratory etiquette, including covering your cough, staying home while ill and getting vaccinated.”
Complications can include dehydration, pneumonia, and bronchitis.
“We’re really, really concerned right now as the holiday season begins,” Pinette said. “People are traveling in planes and trains and buses and people are sneezing into the air and into pressurized areas where it’s not well ventilated, so your risk is increased.”
Anyone experiencing symptoms should visit their doctor to rule out other viral illnesses and consider treatment with the prescription antiviral drug Tamiflu, she said.
“If you’re sick, you need to stay home from work and keep your child home from school until at least 24 hours after symptoms have resolved,” she said.
central maine? not good enough for me.I for one would like to know the town….
Why does it matter?
And what other medical conditions the child had that predisposed him/her to this fatal flu. This story might scare parents into thinking there’s an epidemic out there when it’s just sadly a case of one sick child who couldn’t fight off the flu.
The child was healthy before getting sick with influenza symptoms and
had no underlying medical problems, said Dr. Sheila Pinette, director of
the Maine CDC.
Yes, but was the child vaccinated against the flu? The child in York County, who passed away last year from the flu, had been vaccinated.
Except that he/she didn’t have the immunity that comes from getting the vaccine weeks before contracting the virus. Same thing for adults. Get vaccinated!
When someone gets vacinated they are exposed to the disease and risk getting sick. Most vaccinations use a weak or dead version of the disease; however, if it is debatable as to whether a virus is living or non living, how does one vaccinate using a dead or weak virus?
So how does getting a vaccine for the common cold really help, unless it is a good planned time to get sick and build the immunity for the disease?
I know some people who get sick every time they get vaccinated.
Simplistic, anecdotal.
You understand almost nothing about immunology.
Fill us in
When someone states this
how does one vaccinate using a dead or weak virus?
and this
how does getting a vaccine for the common cold really help
there is nothing else I need to add. Their ignorance on this topic speaks for itself.
edit
Shh, don’t tell too many people, they may not sell as many vaccines.
And that helps this family how? How does this help the community? Perhaps, just a thought, that news agency’s shouldn’t release news articles until they are verified. A phone talk with one person is not verification, it’s……a phone call.
Except that the article said that in the 2010-2011 flu year a vaccinated child died.What’s the explanation for that? I’m sure some are going to try and say that maybe the child didn’t get in time, but there’s no proof of it either way.
This was my first thought when I read the headline. One (sadly) lost life does not an epidemic make, and I’d be willing to bet the pup that dozens of parents rushed to the phone to make appointments to have their children ‘immunized’. “The child was healthy before getting sick with influenza symptoms and had no underlying medical problems” does NOT mean the child’s immune symptom was strong enough to fight off the virus. Immunization does NOT boost the immune system; all it does it shotgun the possibility of mutating the virus to become non-lethal.
So instead of rushing out and sticking your kid with a needle to please the medical community and make you feel safe (I can see this, too, becoming a law to ‘make us safer’), take steps to strengthen and protect your child’s immune system. Echinacea and/or zinc come immediately to my mind–both are naturally occurring treatments that have NO side effects. Stop being so concerned with bleaching everything to sterile your homes. The body of a child who lives in a nearly sterile environment will NEVER develop a strong immune system since it is never exposed to the bacteria that force that strengthening. One of the biggest problems in modernity is that the use of technology has separated us from common sense. I have things “wrong” with me that should have killed me many years ago…I’m convinced that the reason I’m still alive is that I’ve not yet eaten that peck of dirt my father talked about. Nature knows what to do most of the time–stop putting stumbling blocks in ‘her’ way.
Before taking anything, you should read up on it and as your health care provider.Just because something is natural does not mean it has no side effects. Echinacea can cause allergic reaction, gastrointestinal issues as well as skin reactions and if too much is injested, it can cause damage to your liver if taken long term (longer than 8 weeks). Most people have no side effects from the flu vaccine. Zinc has a host of potential side effects.
Getting vaccinated is not just “pleasing the medical community”. It’s good responsibility to the child, to your family, and to the rest of us.
Big difference between bacterial infections and viral. Ecninacea has been shown to not be effective against the common cold and ceratinly not the various flus. Zinc will aleviate a cold but not data on flu.
Classic statement. Your child isn’t vaccinated so i don’t want them around my vaccinated child. If your child already has the vaccines, then what harm can my unvaccinated child cause your vaccinated child?
No vaccine – although the smallpox vaccinia vaccine was close – is 100% effective.
Therefore, I would just consider it risk reduction to exclude non-vaccinated kids.
Bingo! I think you’ve hit upon the answer, archie. For all the non-vaccinating parents who, since the ‘net, have become immunologists, epidemiologists, and overnight experts, let’s just build a whole new school for their kids who manage to live.
Bangor recently just lost a man who’d lived in an iron lung due to polio. Maybe some of those know-it-alls could buy his equipment to have on hand when polio resurfaces.
Selfish _astards, one and all.
The know it all since the net people you refer to are self concerning parents who do their research on things before just putting things into their children.Technology is an awesome tool that allows you to be more educated about making decisions. Before deciding what not to vaccinate my child with I did my research, talked my childs pediatrician and even consulted doctors about the vaccinations and what was in them. You choose to vaccinate your children and yourself, good for you, but no need to start the name calling because some decide not to.
Your pediatrician knows only slightly more about vaccines than most of the commentators on this board. (I’m not being facetious here, either.)
I’m glad you did your due diligence, but i wouldn’t put too much stock in their view.
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are really the only “go to” resource for vaccine education. I’m certainly biased as a former CDC employee, but I have been in the vaccine world for over a decade.
I appreciate your non bias comment. This subject usually brings out anger in most. I feel it is up to the parent to make the best decision for their child and not every parent is going to make the same decision. I have never bashed a parent for deciding to vaccinate their child, they are only doing what they feel is best for their child.
The victim of this serious contagious, sometimes deadly, disease
was a minor.
Most information regarding minors isnt released , for unknown reasons.
Even if it might help with community/public safety.
Need to know basis.
6 from Benton….I guess BDN just cant get the right info if the ever get any.
http://www.kjonline.com/news/Maine-CDC-reports-first-flu-death-this-season.html
I don’t recall ever seeing the morbidly obese listed as a high risk population for catching the flu.
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/disease/high_risk.htm bottom of the list
I heard that the flu shot this year is made up of 1/3 swine flu vaccine. If that is true, and knowing that the swine flu is not a risk, then the only logical reason why it’s in there is that Big Pharma is trying to unload a bunch of unused stock. profits over prophets.
ok……..
i edited this so not to give flu shots a bad repuattion
the injectable flu vaccine is a killed virus – you can’t get sick from it.
It is a dead virus, agreed. However, it is not a cure, and, can, as I’ve heard many people say just as the posting above, cause the body to be pushed into a negative allergic reaction. Immunization does NOT boost the immune system.
I know.knew that already already. Neverthelesss
I know.knew that already already. Nevertheless.
Check your info source. The vaccines would not be “left over” but probably contain strains, newly produced, against the swine flu strain(forgot which one that is).
dhs should be alerted
why? don’t you think the family has been through enough losing a child
Why should DHS be alerted?
Are you saying that you believe every parent HAS to vaccinate their child or risk being investigated by DHS? So in your mind, if I don’t put the flu virus into my child and give them tons of false hormones and such, that I am not a good parent?
I’m not going to get into the “to vaccinate or not” discussion as I don’t think this is the place for it- but I will say that just because someone does not vaccinate DOES NOT mean that they are not a good parent.
“I’m not going to get into the to vaccinate or not discussion as i dont think this is the place for it.” This is exactly the discussion that SHOULD be taking place here.
Based on your misinformration, you’re doing nobody any good by not getting your vaccinated. “Tons of false hormones”? Nohormones involved.
My hormones comment was not about the flu shot, but I can see how it was misread as so.
Looking through your previous posts, it looks like that is all you have to say lately. Were your children taken away and now you are bitter or something?
i’m just saying the truth
My doctor in Ellsworth told us on Saturday that we had a child with confirmed flu in the EEMS school last week…. wish we knew the town….
Anyone with flu symptoms should get vaccinated? Is that really a suggestion? A vaccine that takes 2 weeks to work now is a cure?
Yeah that seems weird. I guess she might have meant tamiflu, not the vaccine.
Be quiet , drop your drawers , bend over.
You may feel a little pressure.
Its for your own good.
Exactly, a vaccine isn’t a cure, it’s shotgun method of mutation.
Didn’t the article state that a York County vaccinated child had died? Now, the scare is on, probably because Mainers are getting smarter about flu shots, realizing that the shot itself might cause the flu in otherwise healthy individuals, and there is an over abundance of vaccine that has to be given. Did this child have the shot?
Yeah, it would be interesting to know if the child had a shot. I’ve known too many people getting sick after getting the flu shot and my faith in big pharma and the government agencies they own in protecting me, but especially my children. It’s sad its come to that. Work on your credibility, then we’ll talk.
In reverse order, assumed not to have had the shot. No info on how much vaccine avialible, and it does not “have to be given”. There is the possibility of flu-like side effects but not in the majority of cases. The smart way is to get immunized, especially the more suseptable populations.
Very heartfelt sorrow to the family of this child.
There are many, many people that are allergic to the stuff these flu shots are made up of. Some of us simply can not have them.And besides that, if your immune system is compromised in any way, having “flu” germs injected in to you is not exactly helping you out!–Guess most people don’t even think there may be a reason why a lot of us don’t immediately run to the nearest place to be injected.
As a child I played in the dirt, swallowed bugs, wipes my nose on my sleeve, chewed my fingernails after scratching the dog, sat in the outhouse on rainy days to be alone to read, got cat baths from my mother, treated scratches with spit on the tip of my thumb, sucked that thumb ingesting what the fuff ever was on it….and the list goes on. I apparently have the immune system of a bull elephant. When ‘flu’ symptoms rear their ugly little heads, I go on a regime of echinacea and increase my zinc intake. I’ve NEVER had a flu. In my not so humble opinion, the answer lies not in artificial efforts to mutate viruses, but in providing our bodies and the bodies of our children with the fuffin means to mutate the viruses naturally.
I use to say the same thing. When i was younger i played street hockey and football for hours outside in under 30degree weather, wearing a tshirt. Ate worse foods for health,almost never ate vegetables. Never got sick.
Give yourself another 10 years and or if you dont already, work a job among the public. See how things change.
Right on. Ask your doctor what the exact ingredients are in the flu shot and other shots given. Then do your research on those ingredients. Nothing better that vitamins and eating right to stay healthy. These shots that doctors want to give kids and adults nowadays are more dangerous than the disease.
Yes that polio vaccine is far worse than polio. Thankfully we have people who know what they are talking about at the CDC.
False. i wondered when your misinformed posts would crop up this flu season.
Misinformed? Not exactly my friend. Probably more informed than the average parent is about vaccinations.
Hi Barb!!! I agree! My mother sheltered me to death as a child. She disinfected EVERYTHING and made suredi I didn’t put anything unclean in my mouth. For the first 12 years of adulthood, I was sick with every little bug that was going around..My husband, on the other hand, was raised in conditions similar to what you describe above. I don’t think he has ever had the flu and I can count on one hand the times he has had a cold or other similar virus that’s going around. Needless to say, I raised my kids to not be scared of dirt and germs! They, like my husband, rarely get sick or catch the latest “bug” that’s going around. Our bodies have amazing immune systems if we allow them to develop.
Only partially true, personal, anecdotal. I was quite sickly all through 1st grade but was quite healthy afterwards, including only a couple of cases of mild flu.
As before, echinacea is not even effective against cols and zinc only moderately so. Your dirt eating probably optimizeded your bacterial . I had the flu during the Asiatic flue of 1957-58 and this gave me moderate immunity for decades (a mild case every five years). Haven’t had a case in decades but started getting the shot when I went on Medicare. Depends on the individual. However, most people need it.
I agree that more people need to be pro active about their health. It requires some discipline and effort. Some would rather just pop a pill, turn to some surgical procedure,etc. Some quick fix. Sure , sometimes those things are unavoidable ( a medication for something) but for the most part, people nowadays don’t want to do the work and discipline.
I agree, too , with your thoughts on using too many anti bacterials, etc. It can be way overdone and backfires. Playing in some dirt when we were growing up never did any harm. I use those wipes on grocery carts , though. I have seen too many people with bad habits,etc. and that grosses me out.
Granted, many people are allergic to eggs which precludes the shots. However, the viruses are killed, it’s the reaction to the remaining protein coat which provides the immunity. Get informed.
I wonder if he got a flu shot this year. Might have saved his life.
Read. At this point, not stated if vaccinated but assumed not.
I think there is something many of you here are missing. For the flu vaccine to be effective your body must mount an immune response to it. In most cases no one even notices: perhaps a little redness, burning or swelling at the injection site but nothing serious.
Myself on the other hand; not only does my arm swell up, get hot and sore, but inevitably I am going to feel sick for several days. I know this is simply my body reacting to the vaccine. I have only gotten the flu once after a flu shot, and it was a doozy of an illness. I think I begged several people to kill me.
I am not happy about getting the vaccine, and if this flu season looks especially bad I will probably give in and get the shot. The point is that we each have to make that choice and if you decide, as I have for the past few years, to not have it, then you must make sure that you do follow those CDC guidelines and do/take/eat, whatever necessary to boost your immune system.
Check with your doctor. You sound suseptible. The swelling and other reactions could be egg allergies.
Some people, like Kathy, simply mount a vigorous immune response. Their body really doesn’t like foreign invaders, but they are better off for it in the end.
How very tragic for this child’s family. Flu is nothing to mess with and it can kill. It can also make a person more vulnerable to other organisms, like MRSA. In past years it was found that many of the people who died of Flu, actually went on to contract MRSA pneumonia. That is a multidrug resistant infection and very difficult to treat. A flu shot is simple and generally without side effects. I choose vaccination. If it helps me to stay Flu free, then I am very happy.
I’ll never for the life of me figure out the “logic” behind peoples actions regarding their health (or other nonsensical actions too long to list…). They are constantly cleaning, disinfecting, sterilizing, etc.; so they won’t be exposed to all those “bad” little germs…. then they go out and get injected with viruses to ‘strengthen their immune system’. Am I really the only one who sees how utterly ignorant this is? Can someone out there please tell me what happened to common sense?!
Because vaccines work
One can overprotect against bacteria, viruses are a different matter although normal cleanliness (hand washing, etc.) can help. Real common sense would tell you that (and avoid ignorance).
Real common sense tells me building up your immune system, in any way, will only help the situation. If you spend your life in a protective bubble, which it seems many aspire to do; then your immune system will have had nothing to strengthen itself against. Did that help your understanding of what I was trying to say? Because your post demonstrates a complete lack of understanding….
As someone who works in the medical field, comments like yours make me shake my head.
My thoughts are with the child’s family. Very tragic.
Horribly sad story. My thoughts and prayers to the child’s family.
““If you’re sick, you need to stay home from work and keep your child home from school until at least 24 hours after symptoms have resolved,”said Dr. Sheila Pinette, director of the Maine CDC”
Problems with that is many people would be fired if they call in sick so they work sick/with the flu. Take China-mart for example..
http://www.masscosh.org/node/455
Most of you(us) know nothing about the flu or the flu vaccine. The shot is not 100% but it helps prevent full blown flu. Those who follow their own medical advice have a fool for a Doctor. Zink and echinaeca are useless products against the flu. Don’t be stupid, get a flu shot.
They sky is falling!! Geez. Before you rush out and get your kid stuck with a vial filled with toxic chemicals, do your research. Flu shots can and do kill. http://vaxtruth.org/2012/01/death-by-flu-shot-7-year-old-receives-flu-vaccine-dies-4-days-later/