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Swine Flu in Toronto

Posted by Tim / April 29, 2009

25 Comments

Swine Flu TorontoSwine Flu concerns in Toronto and the wider Swine Flu epidemic don't seem to be going away anytime soon. Personally, I think local, national and international media are getting just a little bit carried away with the whole thing. Not that there isn't reason for caution but having lived through the SARS fiasco back in 2003 I know that perceptions from afar don't always match local reality.

Nevertheless, for those interested in keeping up with the latest developments and how the city of Toronto is responding to the situation, here's a roundup of recent developments.

  • The city of Toronto has posted a Swine Flu page on their web site with links to suggestions and reports from Toronto Public Health.
  • Mayor Miller reassures the public that the city is ready to deal with Swine Flu cases. He adds that there are no confirmed cases in Toronto.
  • The Globe and Mail later reported that four Ontario residents have come down with mild cases of the Swine Flu.
  • The drop in the TSX (and global stock markets) blamed on Swine Flu.
  • A critically ill Toronto woman was flown back to Toronto despite Swine Flu concerns.
  • The Toronto Star has a Swine Flu page.
And, of course, we can follow the latest Swine Flu news and rumours via Twitter at #swineflu, and via a live, frequently update Google map (embedded below).




View 2009 Swine Flu (H1N1) Outbreak Map in a larger map

Live tracking Google map via Gizmodo.

Lead photo by kingofthenerds on Flickr

Discussion

25 Comments

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killbot / April 29, 2009 at 04:36 am
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anyone know where in ontario there are cases of this reported?
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Sean / April 29, 2009 at 06:10 am
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For your protection, it's a secret.
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Athena / April 29, 2009 at 07:26 am
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Apparently 3 are in Durham region and one is in York region.
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scott / April 29, 2009 at 08:24 am
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A lot of people accuse the media of overreacting about this, but it's really only something that can be determined in retrospect. If the flu doesn't develop into a pandemic, or if it ends up being no big deal, the media overreacted and we can all feel self-righteous about it. If a pandemic develops and millions of people die, we'll call the media response at this point weak and inadequate.

Pandemic flu has the potential to strike those who are healthy, unlike the typical flu which is worse for those who are very old and very young. There's real cause for concern, economically and emotionally, when the spectre of the Spanish Flu of 1918-1919 rises. I'd rather have a bit of media overreaction than silence on this one. Also, it's a nice distraction from Susan Boyle.
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matty / April 29, 2009 at 08:28 am
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Sympatico has a pretty good page too: http://healthandfitness.sympatico.msn.ca/News/swine_flu/
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Jonathan / April 29, 2009 at 08:50 am
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I don't see why you need a retrospective glance to understand that updates on the swine flu death-count, every 10 minutes are an overreaction. Of course media is only about infotainment for the masses now, so it's not surprising. It’s too bad the missing girl in Woodstock isn’t entertaining enough to make the news anymore. Maybe if she had signs of swine flu before she disappeared….
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sippy / April 29, 2009 at 09:22 am
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I'm tired of hearing about swine flu already. Let's call it bacon lung.
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Heather replying to a comment from sippy / April 29, 2009 at 09:28 am
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seconded!
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raymi / April 29, 2009 at 09:44 am
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oh man that map is kinda hilarious
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raymi / April 29, 2009 at 09:45 am
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the fact that they look like LIFE player pieces - not the deaths/ill/sick fact.
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Alicia Jean / April 29, 2009 at 12:00 pm
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Only a matter of time before it's the zombie flu.
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thatguy replying to a comment from Jonathan / April 29, 2009 at 12:44 pm
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The woodstock girl is irrelevant to people that don't know her.
When a 150 children disappear to a linked cause, than there is a larger worry.
The potential pandemic can affect every single person on earth.

The spanish flu has an estimated death toll of 40-100 million people. Which at it's most conservative is larger than the population of Canada. The bigger fallout is the collapse of infrastructure. Our modern medical system would not change this when a significant number of people gets infected.

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Chester Pape / April 29, 2009 at 01:13 pm
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I know I've whinged a little bit about this before but man your photo credit policy leaves a lot to be desired. For future reference real media outlets and even pretend ones like Torontoist, put photo credits right under the flipping photo.

Oh and nice move blanking your referrer logs, classy.
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Tim replying to a comment from Chester Pape / April 29, 2009 at 07:25 pm
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For the layout of our site, we find that crediting photos at the end of the post makes the most sense. We haven't had many complaints.

I have no idea what you mean about us blanking our referrer logs.
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Chester Pape / April 29, 2009 at 10:08 pm
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Only displaying credit to users who make the jump is at the least petty weaselry and I suspect it actually violates the terms of the CC license you agreed to when you used the photo. Don't get me wrong I put the thing in the group with the expectation that you would use it, but I would have expected customary standards of attribution, i.e. the photo credit always visible when the photo is.
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Tim replying to a comment from Chester Pape / April 29, 2009 at 10:37 pm
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Weaselry would assume that we have some motive for not wanting to credit the photo or something which is totally false.
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Jessica / May 4, 2009 at 10:05 pm
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yeah Tim - the whole thing is overblown. totally made up by the media. And then the CDC and WHO (they haven't had a hit in years!) had to follow along and make up stories about people getting sick and dying. And yeah, it's really mild - but spreading all over the world. Mild like the first phase of any pandemic. I'm wondering what people like you will be saying when it really touches your life or the life of someone you care about. As a person who suffers from a compromised immune system I have a lot of worry about. Take a moment away from the convenient responses and start thinking about how this kind of thing effects other people. People like me.
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NC replying to a comment from killbot / May 10, 2009 at 02:29 pm
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where did the toronto swine flu map go?
or more specifically does anyone know how many cases of swine flu there are in toronto now, or where to find the active stat charts?
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NC replying to a comment from NC / May 10, 2009 at 11:43 pm
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http://toronto.ctv.ca/servlet/HTMLTemplate/?tf=ctvlocal%2Fhub%2FhubCap.html&;cf=ctvlocal%2Ftoronto990.cfg&hub=Toronto&page=search&site_codename=Toronto&query=h1n1&x=0&y=0
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NC / June 12, 2009 at 02:07 am
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05/15/2009
Ontario has reported 32 new confirmed H1N1 flu cases in Ontario, with 20 of those in Toronto. That brings the provincial total to 187. More lab testing is being given as the reason for the jump.
05/21/2009
As the number of Ontario H1N1 flu cases climbs closer to 300, provincial authorities are watching the spread of the virus carefully and they plan to continue to monitor it throughout the summer.
#

05/27/2009 Ontario approaching 500th H1N1 flu case (05/27/2009)
Ontario is confirming 143 new cases of the swine flu, bringing the total number of cases in the province to 495.
05/29/2009
The province of Ontario says it has confirmed 131 new cases of H1N1, bringing the total number of provincial cases to 626 since the start of the outbreak.
06/10/2009
That brings the total number of cases in the province to 1,562, it said Wednesday in a news release.

**from CTV website
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brenda / July 27, 2009 at 09:33 pm
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what is the new number of casas in toronto now
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NC / November 5, 2009 at 01:52 pm
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I don't know what the number of new cases, or total cases in Toronto is. That would be good information. It's reported that Ontario worries that they will run out of vaccines. There has also been a lot of media hype about this, and mention that it's the pharmaceutical companies that are profiting. I don't know what the cause of this disease is, but I do know that it has alot of advanced flu-like symptoms-and that I've seen many people who've been sick since the summer. I, like many of us, have frequently been using hand sanitizer, and avoiding higher risk situations. I feel that it's a good idea to get the vaccine if you're at risk of getting H1N1, but it's also important to keep your immune system healthy by eating properly, staying hydrated, avoiding too much stress, getting the right sleep, and taking supplements such as Cold FX, and vitamin C. But I'm not a doctor, these are only things I've noticed by being in Toronto.
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NC / November 5, 2009 at 01:57 pm
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The Toronto Star: H1N1 incident map reports that there were 3171 reported cases in the GTA, as of Oct 31st. (253, 707, 515, 1696). There were 76 reported cases in Barrie. I'm not sure how accurate these reports are, but I'm sure there's some truth to them
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/ November 11, 2009 at 01:19 am
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It was also reported today that in Ontario; "There are 184 people in hospital, up from 136 on Friday. Of those, 69 are in intensive care, up from 64 on Friday."

From the CTV (A)H1N1 website
http://toronto.ctv.ca/servlet/HTMLTemplate/?tf=ctvlocal%2Fhub%2FhubCap.html&;cf=ctvlocal%2Ftoronto990.cfg&hub=Toronto&page=search&site_codename=Toronto&query=h1n1&x=0&y=0
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/ November 12, 2009 at 12:00 am
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Here's a frequently updated swine flu map of Ontario:
http://thestar.blogs.com/maps/2009/06/map-of-the-week-h1n1-in-ontario.html
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