Make sure your medicine works when you need it: Get smart about antibiotics!

Picture this: You’re coughing and sneezing. Not sure if you have a cold or the flu, you head to the bathroom and open the medicine cabinet. Checking through the bottles of pills, you find some antibiotics. Should you take them?

The answer is NO. You could be doing more harm than good! Here’s why:

• Colds and the flu are caused by viruses. Antibiotics don’t work on viruses.
• Taking an antibiotic when you should be taking some other kind of medication can lead to something called antibiotic resistance. Antibiotic resistance happens when bacteria are exposed to an antibiotic medication so much that they figure out how to survive around the medication. This means that medications that treat all kinds of infections won’t work any more. 
• Antibiotic resistance is one of the most serious public health threats around the world, and it’s becoming more common. 

The good news is that you can help to fight antibiotic resistance. Nov. 12-18 is Get Smart About Antibiotics Week, which was created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to help educate the public about antibiotics so they can make smart choices when it comes to taking medications. Here are five tips to protect your health:

1. Do not take antibiotics for a viral infection like a cold, the flu or a runny nose. Here is a chart from CDC to help you figure out if you might have a viral infection. If you’re sick, the best thing to do is to call or make an appointment with your health care provider.
2. Do not ask for antibiotics for you or your child if your doctor says you don’t need them.
3. Do not take antibiotics that were prescribed for other people or for other kinds of infections. The antibiotic might not treat the illness that you have, so you could get sicker.
4. If your health care provider prescribes an antibiotic, take it exactly as they tell you. Finish the whole dose even if you start feeling better before the medication runs out. Don’t skip doses and don’t save medication for the next time you or someone else gets sick.
5. Wash your hands to prevent infections. (Check out our fact sheets for great handwashing information!) Make sure to wash with soap and water or alcohol-based hand sanitizer gel. Regular soap and water are fine, but avoid soaps and cleaners that say “antibacterial” on the label. These products usually have an antibiotic called triclosan, which may contribute to antibiotic resistance.

For more information to help you get smart about antibiotics, check out this Healthy You fact sheet from The Nation’s Health: Antibiotics: Know when they’re not needed. Feel free to share this with friends, family and coworkers too – Everyone has to get smart about antibiotics so that the medications work when we really need them!

If you use Twitter, join us on Tuesday, Nov. 13, at 1 p.m. EST for a Twitter chat about antibiotics. Experts from the CDC will be there to answer your questions. Follow @CDC_eHealth and @GetReady to join in, and don’t forget to use the tag #SaveAbx.

Summer Safe: Don’t let these three infectious diseases ruin your summer fun

Do your late summer plans include a trip to a state or county fair? How about a camping trip, or perhaps a visit to a local farm?

Reports of infectious diseases spread by animals and insects have been on the rise this summer. Here are three infectious diseases that have been in the news recently, along with tips for how you can protect yourself and your loved ones.

H3N2v, aka “swine flu,” from pigs

[Image courtesy
USDA/Scott Bauer]

In the last few weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported new cases of a type of influenza, H3N2v, that comes from pigs. Most of the people who got sick with this new type of flu had direct contact with pigs on farms or at state and county fairs. If you work around pigs or if you will be attending a fair or farm show, follow these tips to protect yourself:

• Always wash your hands after touching animals.
• Don’t eat or drink if you’re in an animal enclosure, and keep your hands away from your face.
• If you have a weak immune system or are at high-risk for flu, stay away from pigs. This includes young children and adolescents, pregnant women, people who are already sick and people ages 65 and older.
• Stay away from any animal that looks sick or acts strange. Call a veterinarian if you suspect that an animal is sick.

For more information, check out CDC’s H3N2v page.

[Image courtesy
USDA/Keith Weller]

Salmonella from baby chickens
Live baby poultry such as ducklings and chickens are adorable — what kid can’t resist picking up one of these cute, fuzzy, chirping animals? Don’t let their cuteness fool you: These animals can pose a health risk, especially to young children. Baby poultry, found in petting zoos, fairs and even in classrooms or at home, have been known to spread salmonella.

This year alone, baby chickens have been linked to salmonella cases in states around the country. Here are some tips to prevent illness from salmonella:

• Don’t let children younger than age 5 touch or handle chicks or ducklings.
• Don’t bring chicks, ducklings or other live poultry into your house.
• Make sure anyone who handles baby poultry washes their hands thoroughly with soap and water. Adults should help young children wash their hands. For information about hand-washing for any age group, check out our collection of Get Ready fact sheets!

CDC has more information on salmonella and baby birds on its website.

West Nile virus from mosquitoes

[Mosquito image courtesy
CDC/ Frank Collins, PhD.]

So far this year, 42 states and the District of Columbia have reported West Nile infections in people, birds or mosquitoes. People get West Nile virus when they are bitten by mosquitoes that carry the disease. You can’t tell if a mosquito is infected just by looking at it, so the best protection is to prevent mosquito bites.

• When you go outdoors, use insect repellent — especially at dusk and dawn, when mosquitoes are most active.
• Wear long sleeves and pants when possible.
• Mosquitoes breed in still water, so remember to empty out barrels, flowerpots and buckets that are filled with water on your property or in your neighborhood. 
• Learn more about protecting yourself from mosquitoes by checking out our fact sheet (PDF).

You can learn more about West Nile virus from CDC.

Even though these infectious diseases are on the rise, protecting yourself can be as simple as washing your hands and wearing bug spray. We hope this helps you stay safe this summer!

2011-2012 flu season is officially over

Welcome to our last Flu Friday post of the season!

This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the 2011-2012 flu season has officially ended. The season is usually declared over when low numbers of people go to the doctor for flu-like illnesses.

In its final FluView report, CDC stated that the “late and mild flu season” has set the record for the lightest and slowest-starting flu season since it started tracking the flu in 1997.

Officials aren’t sure why the flu season was so mild this year, but they think it might have something to do with the warm winter, the fact that many of the flu viruses circulating this year were also around last year and the fact that more people in the U.S. have gotten their annual flu shot.

This doesn’t mean that we’re totally flu-free now. As CDC wrote in its FluView report, “The late start of this season and the fact that flu viruses circulate year-round in the United States means that some flu activity will likely continue to occur in the coming weeks.”

Yes, you can still get the flu in the summer! If you’re helping us track the flu with our FluNearYou tool, we’ll still send out the weekly “How Are You Feeling?” emails.

Be sure to stay healthy this summer by practicing good hand-washing. And don’t forget to check out our new Summer Safe series, where we’ll bring you tips to stay healthy so you can have fun all summer long!

Flu Friday: Canada fails its first Flu Report Card

Happy Flu Friday!

For the first time, some of America’s northern neighbors scored themselves on the flu — and they didn’t make the grade.

Image: Flu Report Card,
courtesy The Lung Association

The British Columbia and Quebec Lung Associations created a Flu Report Card to see how well prepared their provinces were compared to the rest of the country.

Released this week, the report card showed the percentage of adults that received a seasonal flu vaccination during the 2011-2012 flu season. They compared the rate to the percentage of people who reported getting the flu this year. Not surprisingly, provinces where more adults got flu shots reported lower rates of the flu.

Canada’s two most populated provinces, Ontario and Quebec, received the worst grades: D- and F, respectively. Quebec failed because its vaccination rate was the lowest — only 27 percent of adults got the flu shot this year, so one in four people living there got the flu. This is especially bad news considering the weak flu season we’ve had in North America this year.

“Clearly, Quebeckers are not ready for a severe flu season," said Dominique Massie, executive director of the Quebec Lung Association, in a news story.

The report found some good news: 52 percent of British Columbians received the flu vaccine this year, and they reported the lowest rates of the flu, at 10 percent. And overall, more Canadians are getting the flu shot every year. The researchers also found that more people said they would get the flu shot if it was delivered with a smaller needle.

What does this mean for the U.S.? Well, the biggest lesson is that if more people get the flu shot, fewer people get the flu.

We here at Get Ready think it would be really cool to have a Flu Report Card in the U.S. What do you think? If your state was failing at the flu — or passing with flying colors — would that change your flu shot behavior? Let us know in the comments!