Faculty Bibliography

The finding upsets a widely held scientific belief that chimpanzees, the closest relatives to people, can get the simian AIDS virus but without harm.

[...] there can be many other factors, including the numbers and percentages of people falling ill and dying; a population's vulnerability to the disease, based on previous rates of infection; and the quality of health care facilities and disease monitoring systems. [...] Dr. William Schaffner, the chairman of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University, said that 'we, the public health community, deserve to be chided' about the confusion

'It surprised me and my Mexican colleagues, because the textbooks say that in an influenza outbreak the predictive value of fever and cough is 90 percent,' Dr. [Richard P. Wenzel] said by telephone from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, where he is chairman of the department of internal medicine. Dr. Wenzel said he had urged his Mexican colleagues to test the stools for the presence of the swine virus, formally named A(H1N1). 'If the A(H1N1) virus goes from person to person, and there is virus in the stool, infection control will be much more difficult,' particularly if it spreads in poor countries, he said

Fever is a hallmark of influenza, often rising abruptly to 104 degrees at the onset of illness. Because many infectious disease experts consider fever the most important sign of the disease, the presence of fever is a critical part of screening patients.

Fever is a hallmark of influenza, often rising abruptly to 104 degrees at the onset of illness. Because many infectious-disease experts consider fever the most important sign of the disease, the presence of fever is a critical part of screening patients

'When I saw her then, she'd been getting three to four hours of sleep a night for weeks,' said Jeffrey P. Koplan, a former director of the C.D.C. 'They did what they needed to do.' 'With any new disease, it's difficult to understand the full picture,' she said. 'One has to be modest to understand that we are competing against an enemy, the virus. And trying to understand it and reduce the anxiety of the world and reduce the suffering of people, that's not easy.' 'The world's response in a 10-day period was remarkable,' said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, 'and W.H.O. deserves credit for being a big part of it.'

'When I saw her then, she'd been getting three to four hours of sleep a night for weeks,' said Jeffrey P. Koplan, a former director of the C.D.C. 'They did what they needed to do.' 'With any new disease, it's difficult to understand the full picture,' she said. 'One has to be modest to understand that we are competing against an enemy, the virus. And trying to understand it and reduce the anxiety of the world and reduce the suffering of people, that's not easy.' 'The world's response in a 10-day period was remarkable,' said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, 'and W.H.O. deserves credit for being a big part of it.'

'[...] it really is all of humanity that is under threat during a pandemic,' Chan said to the world's gathered news media. Since her announcement, worry over the swine flu outbreak has eased.

'The W.H.O. needs a mechanism to dial down the anxiety levels while educating us about the extent of the transmission,' said Dr. William Schaffner, chairman of the preventive medicine department at Vanderbilt University. All of this authority is packed into a diminutive woman with large glasses who does not drive, type or cook, is fond of sharp suits and silver pins, and may be among the most qualified people in the world to lead the global response to the threat of a pandemic flu

'She is superbly qualified to deal with emergencies like the one we have been living through,' said Dr. Julio Frenk, dean of the Harvard School of Public Health who was [Margaret Chan]'s chief rival when she won the top WHO post in 2006. { SB 'She is the first director-general who has been able to wield these new powers,' said Dr. David L. Heymann, who recently left the organization to become chairman of the Health Protection Agency in Britain. In her announcement on April 29, Chan made it clear that she alone had decided to raise the pandemic alert. 'With any new disease, it's difficult to understand the full picture,' she said. 'One has to be modest to understand that we are competing against an enemy, the virus. And trying to understand it and reduce the anxiety of the world and reduce the suffering of people, that's not easy.'