Today, National Public Radio's Morning Edition commented on the prominent use of Internet resources in the unraveling swine flu pandemic. They mentioned the large number of followers of the CDC Twitt. The New York City Department of Health also has a Twitt, but it has not been updated since last Monday.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) site is quoted most widely by on-line communities, such as the American Society of Microbiology's laboratory DivC discussion group.
In addition to Twitter, the CDC also offers a RSS feed. The CDC site includes a page discussing available rapid flu tests. The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) swine flu page offers e-mail updates and includes information on how to interpret the molecular (rRT-PCR) test for presumptive confirmation of the disease.
The World Health Organization swine flu site also offers a RSS feed. Medscape's swine flu alert center page has links to news, clinical reviews and articles.
Technical information about the CDC molecular test, such as specific target sequences, sample interference, performance with samples other than those collected in viral transport media, etc are not prominently available yet. In the meantime, the National Center for Biotechnology Information is gathering viral isolate sequences at breathtaking speed. Virologist Ruben Donis from the CDC, discussed molecular aspects of the swine flu strain in a ScienceInsider interview yesterday.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment