Thanks to Lucie Lecomte for sending the link to this Times of India report: Death rate among swine flu patients on a high.
JAIPUR: Almost one out of five persons tested positive for swine flu died in the past 46 days in the state. Ever since the influenza has reared up its head again, the health department is concerned over the high death rate.
Figures show that from December 13, 2012 to January 28, 2013, nearly 378 persons were tested positive for swine flu, out of whom 70 had died. The death rate is as high as 18.51%, which is much higher in comparison to the death rate in 2009-10 and 2010-11.
Majority of the swine flu cases reported till date were detected in 2009-10 and 2010-11, when swine flu struck in the state first, but the death rate in 2009-10 was just 5.87% and in 2010-11, it was 7.58%.This is especially surprising because a recent meta-survey found that in the first year of the H1N1 pandemic, the attack rate was 24 per cent—in others words, a quarter of the people in the 19 studied countries contracted H1N1 "swine" flu in 2009-2010. The case fatality rate, however, was just 0.02 per cent, or about one in five thousand. I suspect the discrepancy is due to far more H1N1 cases that are mild or asymptomatic.
