A chance exchange of messages with a prominent GP classmate led me to understand that there may be many doctors in Singapore who are uncomfortable with providing flu shots to children with egg allergy. The issue here is that the vast majority of influenza vaccines contain a tiny amount of ovalbumin – an egg protein […]
Had an opportunity to give a presentation on influenza vaccination at the local School of Public Health‘s Health and Safety Day yesterday, and so had to read up a bit. Influenza is a highly contagious illness caused by the influenza virus, of which there are four main types that we know of, although we primarily […]
Singapore’s Ministry of Health (MOH) announced the National Adult Immunization Schedule (NAIS) yesterday. This is a welcome extension of the National Childhood Immunization Programme (into adulthood), and the amendment to allow the use of Medisave (Singapore’s compulsory national medical savings scheme) for these vaccines (up to SGD400 a year) will facilitate take up of the […]
I was unfortunately not able to spend much time at the SIIDC, which is taking place now at the Waterfront Conference Centre at the Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel. This is actually the second such general infectious disease (ID) conference organized by the Singapore ID community, the first being the Courage Fund Infectious Diseases Conference which […]
I spent a pleasant afternoon yesterday listening to various presentations on completed and semi-completed projects at the SIDI Research Symposium at Waterfront Copthorne (Declaration: I am the current director of the Singapore Infectious Diseases Initiative, or SIDI for short). The projects were very diverse in nature, ranging from basic science to clinical research as well […]
For the week ending 3rd January 2015, influenza activity in the US remained above epidemic levels, defined by the pneumonia and influenza mortality surveillance that was above the epidemic threshold of 6.9% for that week. The laboratory confirmed influenza hospitalisation rates have also gone up in all age groups, alarmingly so for those who are […]
There are a large number of news reports on the flu season in USA currently, including this fairly comprehensive one from CNN, after the statistics for mortality from pneumonia and influenza in the USA crossed 6.8% (the epidemic threshold) on Week 51 of 2014. There have been 15 paediatric deaths to date (as of 20th […]
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