>>Swine flu outbreak no reason to panic

It’s difficult to tell in some instances which is moving faster — the virus or the information announcing its progression. Updates arrive not hourly, but every minute, from every corner of the globe.

Here in Kingston, we can go online to www.kfla.ca and click on the infection watch live website to monitor changes in area illness activity. Green, yellow and red indicate, respectively, normal, elevated or high activity of respiratory and gastrointestinal illnesses.

Full Article:  here.

>> Kingstonians appear to be taking outbreak seriously

Gemmill said that local health authorities are monitoring the new influenza strain via a 24- hour “syndromic surveillance” system that reports any unusual changes in respiratory and gastrointestinal illness activity. The public can view the system by logging onto www.kfla.ca and clicking on “infection watch live website.”

Full Article:  here.

This morning’s Globe & Mail features a profile on Infonaut, and the relevance of our Infection Watch Live solution to the H1N1 outbreak:

In 1854, Dr. John Snow plotted cholera cases on a map of London, England, to find the source of a serious outbreak that was killing hundreds of people. It became apparent that the biggest clusters of the disease were near a public water pump on Broad Street, and Dr. Snow was able to stop the spread by shutting down that source.

Fast-forward one-and-a-half centuries to Toronto, where a small firm is using 21st-century software to create maps with similar goals — the containment of disease — by showing infection patterns that can be understood at a glance.

Full Article:  Charting the right course through an outbreak