The Prescription Center Pharmacy, headquartered in Beverly Hills, California announced its “Be Prepared, Not Scared” campaign today. The purpose of the campaign is to help both businesses and consumers stay healthy, without dramatically changing their daily routines. Dr. Afshin Nassir, the pharmacy’s Founder and CEO, states that “We want to help businesses and consumers create a realistic plan to deal with the H1N1 (Swine Flu) Virus, which is now, according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), at a Pandemic stage.”
According to the CDC (www.cdc.gov/), The World Health Organization (WHO), states that “Since the declaration of a pandemic, the new H1N1 virus has continued to spread, with the number of countries reporting cases of novel H1N1 nearly doubling.” In addition, one thing that appears to be different from seasonal influenza is that adults older than 64 years do not yet appear to be at increased risk of 2009 H1N1-related complications thus far. CDC laboratory studies have shown that no children and very few adults younger than 60 years old have existing antibody to 2009 H1N1 flu virus; however, about one-third of adults older than 60 may have antibodies against this virus.
Salena Dhillon Zanotti, MD, FACOG at Fairview Hospital, part of the Cleveland Clinic Health System, further states that “all pregnant women should get the seasonal influenza vaccine and the H1N1 vaccine. Pregnant women are known to be at a higher risk for complications from infection with seasonal influenza and with H1N1 influenza. Children over the age of 6 months should receive both vaccines as well. If a household has an infant less than 6 months of age, the close contacts should be vaccinated as well. If a woman receives either the seasonal influenza or the H1N1 influenza vaccine, she should continue with breastfeeding as breastfeeding is both safe and extremely protective for the infant.”
Dr. Zanotti further states that “standard hygiene practices are recommended. Covering your nose and mouth when sneezing. Throwing away a tissue after you use it. Hand washing with soap and warm water. Any alcohol based hand cleaners are helpful as well. Try to avoid close contact with sick people. Anti-viral kleenex are available. These are a 3 layer tissue paper with sodium lauryl sulfate in the middle that is advertised as killing 99% of virus it comes into contact with. This has not been tested with H1N1. Ideally, everyone should throw away their kleenex after using it.”
As Nassir states, “We will likely see the younger, usually healthy portion of the population at a more than normal risk of contracting the virus. But, there are actions business owners, landlords and consumers can take that help reduce the odds of contracting this virus.” Most of these suggestions are contained on the CDC’s website, but The Prescription Center Pharmacy takes matters further. “We want to take a pro-active approach in helping people prepare.”