California Flu
There’s a surge in flu on the US west coast due to the A/California/07/2004 virus, unrelated to the dreaded A/H5N1 avian flu, bbut a nasty character even so. Sabin Russell writes about this nasty flu outbreak in SF Gate.
[tease]
Medical laboratories that serve as sentinels for the annual arrival of the flu season have picked up a spike in influenza cases in California, Oregon, Arizona, New Mexico and Kansas — with a widespread outbreak reported under way in Utah.
According to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly all the viruses analyzed so far come from a strain of influenza labeled A/California/07/2004 — named after a flu virus first isolated in Santa Clara County last year.