Content about Pandemics

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. More people felt the 2009-2010 cough-cold season was “about the same” or only “slightly worse” than the year prior, a recent national survey of 1,017 Americans sponsored by Matrixx Initiatives found.

A little less than half, 42%, characterized this past year’s season as about the same historically with regard to illness levels, and 21% suggested it was slightly worse in large part because of the H1N1 pandemic hype.

ATLANTA A panel of immunization experts reporting to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday voted to expand the recommendation for annual influenza vaccination to include all people ages 6 months and older, a marked change from recommendations in the past that identified high-priority groups by age and condition, groups that apply to approximately 85% of the population.

WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT'S IMPORTANT Not even the threat of an H1N1 flu pandemic could shake today’s recession-minded employee from losing any hours for something like a cold or flu. And not even the Department of Health, which consistently advised sick people to stay home, could change that. Not this year.

(THE NEWS: New survey sheds light on cough-cold medicine purchases. For the full story, click here)

WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT'S IMPORTANT It’s important for three reasons. First, the government is making a strong push for people to get their flu shots — both seasonal and H1N1. Second, that H1N1 flu shot is widely available at your local retail pharmacy. And third, this will further help establish retail pharmacy as the convenient go-to source for health.

NEW YORK If there’s a huckster swindling supplements as the latest cure-all, turns out it’s not a supplement they’re swindling after all. If not an illicit pharmaceutical outright, it’s at the very least a mismarketed snake oil, and this band of supplement associations is helping to stamp those hucksters out.

NEW YORK There still is widespread concern over the safety and efficacy of the new H1N1 influenza vaccine, despite public assurances from executives at the highest levels of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — the point agency around the H1N1 pandemic — that the H1N1 vaccines have been subject to the same safety and efficacy protocols as seasonal vaccine, which generally is considered both safe and effective.

NEW YORK This story was picked up yesterday by our Drug Store News team for the Weekly Drug Fix as a prime example of the convenience that an established drug store footprint, combined with a burgeoning retail-based convenient clinic care model, can deliver to the American public.