Swine-flu deaths 'quite striking' in pregnant women

In a reminder that the new strain of H1N1 influenza may not be as benign as originally thought, federal health officials said Thursday that 100 pregnant women infected with the virus were hospitalized in intensive-care units in the first four months of the outbreak, and 28 died.

"What we are seeing is quite striking," said Anne Schuchat, a physician at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta who is helping direct the government's response to the pandemic.

"The obstetric caregivers here, and the ones that we're speaking with (around the country) have rarely seen this kind of thing in practice," she said at a weekly briefing. The 28 deaths occurred between the rise of the new strain in late April and the end of August.

Until this outbreak, hospitals were not required to report to public-health authorities deaths from influenza, except in children. As a consequence, the "expected" mortality of pregnant women who become ill with seasonal flu strains is not known.

"Whether this is more common or people are just noticing it because we're attending to this H1N1 virus, it's difficult to say," Schuchat said. However, she added, anecdotal reports are that "doctors around the country ... have never seen this kind of thing before."

Schuchat also said there was "significant flu activity in virtually all states," which, she added was "quite unusual for this time of year."

Pregnant women are among the five "initial target groups" that public-health authorities say should be offered the pandemic H1N1 vaccine when it is available.

Also Thursday, a 23-year-old recruit in basic training in Fort Jackson, S.C., was acknowledged to be the Army's first swine-flu death. The recruit, Spc. Christopher M. Hogg, of Deltona, Fla., fell ill Sept. 1 and died Sept. 10 of pneumonia, the military said. Although Hogg initially tested negative for swine flu, it was found on autopsy.

About 50,000 troops a year train at Fort Jackson.

Flu cases are rising in many parts of the country, according to media reports.

Dell Children's Medical Center in Austin, Texas, erected two tents in its parking lot to handle emergency-room visits, and hospitals near Colorado Springs had a 30 percent spike in flu visits. Several North Carolina hospitals barred children from visiting.

Because pediatric cases are increasing, the Department of Health and Human Services on Tuesday released 300,000 courses of children's liquid Tamiflu from the national pandemic stockpile, with the first batches going to Texas and Colorado.

Some batches were past the expiration date, Schuchat said, but the Food and Drug Administration tested the stocks and certified them as usable.

More than 99 percent of all swine-flu cases are mild to moderate, but millions of people with relatively common problems such as asthma, obesity, diabetes or heart problems are at higher risk, as are pregnant women and infants too young for vaccine.

Last week, the centers reported 936 Americans had died of flu symptoms or of flu-associated pneumonia since Aug. 30, when it began a new count of deaths, including some without lab-confirmed swine flu.

That is few compared with the 36,000 that die annually of seasonal flu, but the deaths are concentrated in age groups that do not normally succumb, and the regular flu season will not arrive until November.

Confirming the CDC's anxiety that many Americans are reluctant to get swine-flu shots, Consumer Reports released a poll late Wednesday showing that half of all parents surveyed said they were worried about the flu, but only 35 percent would definitely get their children vaccinated.

About half were undecided, and of those, many said they feared the vaccine was new and untested.

One worrying aspect, said Dr. John Santa, the director of health ratings at Consumer Reports, was that 69 percent of parents who were undecided or opposed to shots said they "wanted their children to build up their natural immunity."

"Your body produces exactly the same antibodies, whether it's from a 'natural' infection or from a vaccine," Santa said. "If your child is the one that dies, you've paid a very high price for 'natural' immunity."

The poll was a phone survey of 1,502 adults from Sept. 2 to Sept. 7, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Material from The New York Times is included in this report.