I have Pneumonia

[geauxtohell]

That's a bummer, I hope you feel better very very soon.

There is this stuff called Airborne that when I start to get to feeling sick I take. Can get it at most pharmacies. You drop it in some water and drink it.

It's about 7 bucks and the Lemon Lime one tastes pretty good actually. Just suggesting it (if you want) as it has a bunch of good stuff in it to try to help your weakened immune system.

Airborne Effervescent Health Formula


.

No offense (I used to use it too), but that stuff is total voodoo.

There is no evidence based medicine that it does much of anything. The same with pounding vitamin C.

people swear by it. Placebo effect?

Most likely. It's typically 30% and that was discovered on the beaches of Italy by an Army Doctor who ran out of morphine and told wounded GIs he was giving them morphine when he was giving them normal saline. Placebo is powerful enough to work on gunshot wounds.

That and likely some confounding effects of people who "take it at the first sign of illness" clearing some relatively mild illness through their own immune systems and as they would anyways and attributing that to Airborne.

 

[Spoonman]

No offense (I used to use it too), but that stuff is total voodoo.

There is no evidence based medicine that it does much of anything. The same with pounding vitamin C.

people swear by it. Placebo effect?

Most likely. It's typically 30% and that was discovered on the beaches of Italy by an Army Doctor who ran out of morphine and told wounded GIs he was giving them morphine when he was giving them normal saline. Placebo is powerful enough to work on gunshot wounds.

That and likely some confounding effects of people who "take it at the first sign of illness" clearing some relatively mild illness through their own immune systems and as they would anyways and attributing that to Airborne.

so then it works

 

[geauxtohell]

people swear by it. Placebo effect?

Most likely. It's typically 30% and that was discovered on the beaches of Italy by an Army Doctor who ran out of morphine and told wounded GIs he was giving them morphine when he was giving them normal saline. Placebo is powerful enough to work on gunshot wounds.

That and likely some confounding effects of people who "take it at the first sign of illness" clearing some relatively mild illness through their own immune systems and as they would anyways and attributing that to Airborne.

so then it works

If it make's people "feel better" then it might be worth the $. However, it doesn't "work" in the sense that it is addressing the underlying pathology.

In a similar vein, if we were giving chemo patients normal saline and telling them it was chemo, the might think they were getting better, but it's not "working".

 

[Spoonman]

Most likely. It's typically 30% and that was discovered on the beaches of Italy by an Army Doctor who ran out of morphine and told wounded GIs he was giving them morphine when he was giving them normal saline. Placebo is powerful enough to work on gunshot wounds.

That and likely some confounding effects of people who "take it at the first sign of illness" clearing some relatively mild illness through their own immune systems and as they would anyways and attributing that to Airborne.

so then it works

If it make's people "feel better" then it might be worth the $. However, it doesn't "work" in the sense that it is addressing the underlying pathology.

In a similar vein, if we were giving chemo patients normal saline and telling them it was chemo, the might think they were getting better, but it's not "working".

if it eliminates the cold symptoms that is good. nothing cures a cold. aspirin, cough syrups, all they do is relive symptoms. they don't cure

 

[waltky]

Youth pneumonia vaccine drive launched in Pakistan...

Mass Pakistan pneumonia vaccination campaign launched
9 October 2012 - The pneumococcal vaccine is initially due to be rolled out in Punjab province, then Sindh

Pakistan has become the first South Asian country to introduce a vaccine against a virulent form of pneumonia - one of the nation's biggest killers of children, officials say. The pneumococcal vaccine will be given to five million children annually. It is the largest roll-out of its kind following similar drives in Africa and Central America. The programme - backed by the UN and a leading aid agency - was officially launched by PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf. Officials from the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (Gavi) say they do not expect the immunisation drive to suffer the same problems that have recently affected efforts to introduce a polio vaccine in the north of Pakistan.

In July, officials said that about 250,000 children in the tribal areas had not received a polio vaccine because of a Taliban-imposed ban. The militants said vaccinations in North and South Waziristan were banned until the US ended drone strikes in the region. Administering polio vaccines has been further complicated since the death of Osama Bin Laden in May last year by the fallout from the CIA's decision to use a fake vaccination programme - allegedly carried out by Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi - to confirm the whereabouts of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

'Important milestone'

Gavi officials say that because the vaccine against the pneumococcal form of pneumonia is administered routinely soon after birth - along with several other vaccines - it is much easier to deliver than the polio vaccine. It is estimated that about 80,000 children die every year from pneumonia in Pakistan, and about a third of deaths are due to the pneumococcal form of the disease.

The vaccine is being delivered through a partnership between the Pakistan government, Gavi, the UN children's fund and the World Health Organization (WHO). "The introduction of the pneumococcal vaccine represents an important milestone in the fight to reduce the heavy infant and child mortality burden facing Pakistan's families," Pakistan WHO representative Guido Sabatinelli said. The pneumococcal vaccine is initially due to be rolled out in Punjab province, then Sindh and then the rest of the country. The plan is for the vaccine to be extended to Bangladesh next year.

BBC News - Mass Pakistan pneumonia vaccination campaign launched

See also:

Karachi: Brain-eating amoeba kills 10
9 October 2012 : People are being urged to use clean water at all times

A rare brain-eating amoeba is responsible for at least 10 deaths in the Pakistani city of Karachi in recent months, health officials believe. The source of the parasite is not yet known, but it is thought victims may have been exposed to it when using water to rinse their nasal passages. The amoeba, Naegleria Fowleri, lives in warm water and kills its victims by destroying brain tissue.

Officials are now increasing the amount of chlorine in the public water supply. The deaths are in various locations across Karachi, Pakistan's biggest city. Dr Shakeel Mallick, who works for the provincial health department, said nine of those killed were men, while one victim was a child of four. Officials suspect other cases may have gone undetected. Dr Mallick said hospitals were now being "vigilant". The ministry was "very concerned" about the amoeba, he said.

Cities on alert

Although the amoeba is usually picked up in contaminated pools or lakes, only one of those killed had been swimming. Officials are therefore concentrating their attention on the possibility that people picked it up when cleaning out their nostrils - a practice which is common in South Asia, BBC regional analyst Jill McGivering says. The amoeba travels to the brain through the nasal passages. Those infected have symptoms including fever, nausea and vomiting, as well as a stiff neck and headaches. Most die within a week.

The World Health Authority's Musa Khan says other cities across Pakistan have been put on alert. An awareness campaign has also been launched among health workers and the public. "People should avoid getting water too deep into their nostrils," Mr Khan said. "Those with symptoms should seek help immediately." People are being advised to use boiled or chlorinated water to rinse their noses, and to clean out domestic water tanks where amoeba may flourish. The amoeba cannot be passed from person to person.

BBC News - Karachi: Brain-eating amoeba kills 10

 

[waltky]

Pneumonia kills more children than any other disease in the world...

UN Calls for Action on Pneumonia in Children
November 11, 2012 — The United Nations is observing World Pneumonia Day on November 12 by calling on country leaders to spring into action to reduce child deaths from pneumonia. U.N. and other health agencies say the world has the means to save hundreds of thousands of children’s lives from this preventable disease.

Pneumonia kills more children than any other disease in the world. The U.N. Children’s Fund reports every 25 seconds a child dies from pneumonia. It kills 3,400 children a day or 1.3 million a year. By this calculation, pneumonia accounts for 18 percent of the 6.9 million child deaths a year. As with many other diseases, the main victims are the world’s poorest, most marginalized children. They are the ones who cannot afford the treatments and vaccines that could save their lives. UNICEF spokeswoman, Marixie Mercado, says 90 percent of all child deaths from pneumonia occur in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

“But, it is easily preventable and it is easily treatable," she said. "Basically, the evidence shows that if the poorest households had the same basic interventions that are available to the richest households, millions of children would live instead of die, due to a totally preventable disease.” Pneumonia can result from vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles and whooping cough. About 85 percent of the world’s children receive these life-saving vaccines. The poorest do not. UNICEF is calling for universal vaccine coverage so all children, even the poorest, are protected.

Streptococcus pneumonia and Haemophilus influenza type b are two major causes of bacterial pneumonia. They can be prevented through PCV and Hib vaccines. Most low- income countries have introduced the influenza type b Hib vaccines against pneumonia. But, UNICEF’s Mercado says the introduction of PCV vaccines in low-income countries is proceeding at a slower pace. “The same is true with treatment," she said. "Right now, less than a third of children with pneumonia received antibiotics in developing countries. Just recently, a report by the U.N. Commission on Life Saving Commodities estimated that over 1.5 million children could be saved if amoxicillin - an antibiotic that costs 30 centimes per treatment dose, were more widely available.”

Children in poorer countries are at higher risk of getting pneumonia, a respiratory disease, than those in richer countries because of indoor air pollution. Low-income households burn wood, dung and coal for cooking or heating, with poorly ventilated fires and stoves. Overcrowded homes also contribute to higher levels of childhood pneumonia. Health experts say a number of preventive measures other than vaccines and antibiotics are effective in staving off pneumonia. These include safe drinking water and improved sanitation, as well as the promotion of practices such as exclusive breastfeeding and use of clean cook stoves to reduce indoor air pollution. They say frequent hand washing with soap and water reduces the incidence of pneumonia by 23 percent. Unfortunately, they note hand washing is not routinely practiced in most developing countries, especially among the poor.

Source

 

[waltky]

Wearable pneumonia detector...

Ugandan engineers invent app, ‘smart jacket’ to help diagnose pneumonia
Mon, Jan 23, 2017 - A team of Ugandan engineers has invented a “smart jacket” that diagnoses pneumonia faster than a doctor, offering hope against a disease which kills more children worldwide than any other.

The idea came to Olivia Koburongo, 26, after her grandmother fell ill and was moved from hospital to hospital before being properly diagnosed with pneumonia. “It was now too late to save her,” Koburongo said. “It was too hard to keep track of her vitals, of how she’s doing, and that is how I thought of a way to automate the whole process and keep track of her health.” Koburongo took her idea to fellow telecommunications engineering graduate Brian Turyabagye, 24, and together with a team of doctors they came up with the “Mama-Ope” (Mother’s Hope) kit made up of a biomedical smart jacket and a mobile phone app, which does the diagnosis.

Pneumonia — a severe lung infection — kills up to 24,000 Ugandan children under the age of five per year, many of whom are misdiagnosed as having malaria, according to the UNICEF. A lack of access to laboratory testing and infrastructure in poor communities means health workers often have to rely on simple clinical examinations to make their diagnoses. With the easy-to-use Mama-Ope kit, health workers merely have to slip the jacket onto the child, and its sensors pick up sound patterns from the lungs, temperature and breathing rate. “The processed information is sent to a mobile phone app [via Bluetooth] which analyzes the information in comparison to known data so as to get an estimate of the strength of the disease,” Turyabagye said.

Telecommunications engineer Olivia Koburongo fits a child with the Mama-Ope kit at the Makerere University of Public Health in Kampala, Uganda​

The jacket, which is still only a prototype, can diagnose pneumonia up to three times faster than a doctor and reduces human error, according to studies done by its inventors. Traditionally doctors use a stethoscope to listen for abnormal crackling or bubbling sounds in the lungs. However, if medics suspect malaria or tuberculosis — which also include respiratory distress — the time lost treating those rather than pneumonia could prove deadly for their patient. “The problem we’re trying to solve is diagnosing pneumonia at an early stage before it gets severe and we’re also trying to solve the problem of not enough manpower in hospitals because currently we have a doctor to patient ratio which is one to 24,000 in the country,” Koburongo said.

Turyabagye said plans were under way to have the kit piloted in Uganda’s referral hospitals and then trickle down to health centers. “Once you have this information captured on cloud storage, it means a doctor who is not even in the rural area, who is not on the ground, can access the same information from any patient and it helps in making an informed decision,” he said. The team is also working on patenting the kit, which is shortlisted for this year’s Royal Academy of Engineering Africa Prize. “Once it is successful [in Uganda] we hope it is rolled out to other African countries and major parts of the world where pneumonia is killing thousands of children,” Koburongo said. According to UNICEF, most of the 900,000 annual deaths of children under five due to pneumonia occur in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. This is more than other causes of childhood death such as diarrhea, malaria, meningitis or HIV/AIDS.

Ugandan engineers invent app, ‘smart jacket’ to help diagnose pneumonia - Taipei Times