Via Mauricio Beltran’s Precavido blog: Estado do Pará tem pelo menos 9 mortes pela gripe suína (H1N1) apenas neste ano. [State of Pará has at least 9 H1N1 deaths so far this year] Excerpt, with my translation:
Segundo dados de diversos jornais da região, com informações coletadas por colega leitora do blog que gentilmente enviou os links, o estado do Pará já possui ao menos 9 casos confirmados de óbitos causados pela gripe suína (H1N1) apenas neste ano.
According to data from various regional journals, collated by a colleague-reader who kindly sent the links, the state of Pará now has at least 9 H1N1 deaths so far this year.
The rest of the post provides details on the cases. And it raises a worrying issue: Without the efforts of individuals like Mauricio Beltran and his colleague, even ordinary Brazilians would have little sense of what’s going on in their own country.
It’s just another example of a problem I’m increasingly aware of since I started covering other diseases like dengue and malaria: Outside the immediate hot zone of an outbreak, no one cares—or even wants to know. If all politics is local, so are pandemics.
