Friday, June 19, 2009

What shall we do then??

First, mabrouk l masr:) Well, I said it many times before but here I am mentioning it again: I am working as a laboratory doctor!! What is H1N1 (known also as swine flu)?? It is one type of Influenza A virus. What is Influenza A virus? It is one virus that commonly affects people causing them influenza!!! It is the most common cause of seasonal influenza that affects all people in winter. I am not gonna talk about details tha are written every where, but believe me this H1N1 is not more dangerous than the seasonal influenza by any mean. Any way, It is a pandemic now!! People are freaked out, every one with a fever thinks that it's the swine flu. It is well known that if some thing causes a global panic attack then saying "Don't worry, it's O.k, it is not that dangerous as it appears" won't resolve the issue!! As we are not talking about an unknown virus, there is a simple accurate rapid laboratory test that can detect the presence of the virus inside the human body. This is my job & I claim that I can assure you 100 % whether you have the infection or not, so that you can start your treatment in the proper time. BUT, the Egyptian ministry of health prohibited the private laboratories from doing the test. We haven't received any thing official yet, but they are saying it every where & they are warning people from being fooled by those vampires working in the laboratories. O.K, I am a citizen with a fever & I want to know if it is a swine flu or not, where should I go? To the fever hospital in my city. Will they do the test to any one who has fever? No, come on people, we can't afford doing the test to you all!! Fine, I can pay for it, would you please take the sample from me?? Nooooooooo, it is not for sale!! The ministry is providing it for free!! Then do me the test for free please!! No, You are not indicated!! N.B: A technical point, the fever hospitals are not using the proper technique, they took a sample from a patient admitted in a private hospital here in Alexandria & they gave us a result after 2 hours saying that the guy is negative for H1N1. I can assure you that what appeared after 2 hours is just a screening test that can be positive or negative, but a confirmatory test takes at least 6 working hours from the time of processing the sample. Now to some up: Private labs cannot do the test, Fever hospitals don't do the test for every one, Fever hospitals don't accept money from people who just want to check on themselves, Fever hospitals use a crude rapid method in performing the analysis. So, what shall we do??