America's North Shore Journal

Here is the New York State swine flu / novel H1N1 case update as of June 10, 2009, in the late afternoon.

The media spent a lot of wordage yesterday on mis-characterizing a report issued by the New York City Health Department. Sample headline:

NY Times: 12 Flu Victims Have Died, and Ill May Total 550,000

Here is the link to the report itself. In a telephone poll, enough participants reported influenza like illness (ILI) to suggest that 6.9% of New York City residents may have experienced an ILI. It was a self reported survey and no medical confirmations were done. An ILI is not novel H1N1 or swine flu. In fact, as NYS testing suggested in mid May, up to 88% of the people with an ILI did not have any variant of the influenza virus.

The NY Times has an incorrect headline.

Here is the latest map of NYS counties with H1N1 outbreaks. Upstate, Erie County and Buffalo are running a very close second to Onondaga County and Syracuse. Monroe County and Rochester are running a very distant third.

New York State map of counties with novel H1N1 or swine flu cases as of June 10 2009

New York State has 1,241 cases of novel H1N1 or swine flu. New York City, just the 5 boroughs, has 820 cases. The city and its surrounding counties, Nassau, Suffolk, Rockland and Westchester, have a total case count of 1,009 cases.