Beer and bugs
Bracketing a rather frantic day of conference calls yesterday were two contrasting but fun events.
In the morning I went to a session hosted by Longwoods where the Ontario Agency For Health Protection and Promotion gave us an update on the progress of H1N1 influenza in the province and on the current plans for dealing with this winter's flu season. The good news is that there is lots of good news. Incidence, severity and mortality are all way below the predicted levels used for scenario planning, which were based on the 1957 Spanish influenza outbreak. Also the treatment approaches being used seem to be much more effective than they were in 1957. Then, 20% of flu patients who ended up in the ICU died. That figure is down to around 5% (apparently due mainly to the use of ventilators and, of course, anti-virals). The other good news is that there is now very strong evidence that anyone born before 1957 has a strong chance of having already developed immunity to this particular virus so one very large segment traditionally hit hard by flu may not do so badly. Not such good news for the very young of course. We also had confirmation that H1N1 vaccine will be available early next month. The not so good news is that early next month may not be soon enough. Apparently there has been an uptick in case numbers in the last few days and we may be in for a very early flu season.
I also learned a lot about virology which is probably pretty basic stuff but is new to me. I loved this graphic showing how two viruses sharing the same host could swap RNA segments to create an essentially new virus. Apparently our H1N1 friend is very unstale and prone to do this.
Other interesting presentation material showed the importance of air travel as the main vector for transmitting infectious diseases. Mosquitos and rats are so quattrocento!
Fast forward to 5pm and it was time for the C'est What semi-annual Craft Brewery Festival. This is usually a really good event but this time it was a bit disappointing. Most times I expect to find a couple of stand out beers that I haven't tried before. Not this time. Nothing was really awful but there were no revelations either. Probably the most interesting was from Flying Monkeys. It was called something like Hoppopottomonkeys and it was 'hop filtered' which meant that it was pumped through a cassette of hops on its way to the glass. This produced an unusual flavour profile which the lemur liked more than I did. There was definitely a seaweed note and maybe a tinge of soap too. So, not a vintage night really.
In the morning I went to a session hosted by Longwoods where the Ontario Agency For Health Protection and Promotion gave us an update on the progress of H1N1 influenza in the province and on the current plans for dealing with this winter's flu season. The good news is that there is lots of good news. Incidence, severity and mortality are all way below the predicted levels used for scenario planning, which were based on the 1957 Spanish influenza outbreak. Also the treatment approaches being used seem to be much more effective than they were in 1957. Then, 20% of flu patients who ended up in the ICU died. That figure is down to around 5% (apparently due mainly to the use of ventilators and, of course, anti-virals). The other good news is that there is now very strong evidence that anyone born before 1957 has a strong chance of having already developed immunity to this particular virus so one very large segment traditionally hit hard by flu may not do so badly. Not such good news for the very young of course. We also had confirmation that H1N1 vaccine will be available early next month. The not so good news is that early next month may not be soon enough. Apparently there has been an uptick in case numbers in the last few days and we may be in for a very early flu season.
I also learned a lot about virology which is probably pretty basic stuff but is new to me. I loved this graphic showing how two viruses sharing the same host could swap RNA segments to create an essentially new virus. Apparently our H1N1 friend is very unstale and prone to do this.
Other interesting presentation material showed the importance of air travel as the main vector for transmitting infectious diseases. Mosquitos and rats are so quattrocento!
Fast forward to 5pm and it was time for the C'est What semi-annual Craft Brewery Festival. This is usually a really good event but this time it was a bit disappointing. Most times I expect to find a couple of stand out beers that I haven't tried before. Not this time. Nothing was really awful but there were no revelations either. Probably the most interesting was from Flying Monkeys. It was called something like Hoppopottomonkeys and it was 'hop filtered' which meant that it was pumped through a cassette of hops on its way to the glass. This produced an unusual flavour profile which the lemur liked more than I did. There was definitely a seaweed note and maybe a tinge of soap too. So, not a vintage night really.