Pneumonia, how many cases are 'normal'?

I live in Belgium, Europe

I know pneumonia is common, but it's not like I often meet people who have/had it. I meet a lot of people in my store and sometimes a year goes by before I hear about it again.

But in the last 3 months, 4 people in my direct environment had pneumonia and my customers don't seem to talk about anything else. Everyone knows someone who has it, hospitalized or not.
My colleagues daughter had it last week and she couldn't even be committed to a hospital because they where full, most pneumonia cases: children and elderly persons (our news did a short story on this last week) and it's country-wide, not local

My husband suddenly developed a high fever last night that we couldn't bring down (still can't) and his lungs started to hurt, even when he didn't cough. He went to the doctor this morning and he said it was pneumonia and gave him antibiotics.
24 hours went by and now my lungs are starting to hurt as well, pretty bad actually and I didn't even have a cough or a cold or the flu in the last 6 months. Neither did my husband. Since an hour ago my own daughter started to feel sick as well. It's back to the doc for us in the morning.
two days ago we where all perfectly fine, not one cough or sneeze!

We really do see an increase in pneumonia cases around here which makes no sense to me.

Now I didn't have a medical education and everything I think I know I've learned from the Internet, so what I'm about to write next might as well be very wrong so pls correct me:

If my doc prescribes antibiotics, he must suspect a bacterial infection, because antibiotics don't kill viruses.
Most of the bacteria that cause pneumonia are 'home' in our upper lungs and they only cause an infection after or together with a bad flu or cold.
Pneumonia itself is not contagious.

so how can there be such a big increase in cases all of a sudden?

I'm making this thread to see if the same thing is going on in other places? And if maybe someone with a medical background can shed a light on this one

I was under the impression that Pneumonia is a condition one may experience due to a number of different causes not a disease one catches?

Same thing here in GA! I have heard of more cases of pneumonia in the past month than I have in the rest of my life put together. Many have been perfectly healthy teenage boys who just suddenly had pneumonia. It's bizarre.

What's up?

Originally posted by Josephus
I was under the impression that Pneumonia is a condition one may experience due to a number of different causes not a disease one catches?

yup, that's what I thought!
but both the doctors and hospitals are calling this thing 'pneumonia'.

I'm trying to not think the worst, even though I'm starting to feel worse by the hour.... but I am really doubting that this is what they say it is.

reply to post by GeorgiaGirl


Where is "GA"?

Same here, a lot of children and teens who where perfectly healthy just days before, but also more adults then usual

edit: nvm, just noticed your username! lol
GA stands for Georgia I suppose

Originally posted by GypsK
reply to post by GeorgiaGirl

 

Where is "GA"?

Same here, a lot of children and teens who where perfectly healthy just days before, but also more adults then usual

edit: nvm, just noticed your username! lol
GA stands for Georgia I suppose

edit on 18/12/2012 by GypsK because: (no reason given)

edit on 18/12/2012 by GypsK because: (no reason given)

Sorry! Georgia, USA. You mean everyone in the world hasn't memorized our state abbreviations????? Kidding....

We have also had the earliest flu season in decades. But the people with pneumonia haven't been the someone's with the flu.

So odd you mention this!! I just got out of the hospital for being sick with it. I never get this. I didnt even know what it was thought it was my heart.

My neighbor across the street has it, and my friend who lives a couple streets down has it. Its hard to shake off.
We have all been sick a while now. I think the weather here has something to do with it. So windy and so much dust. I am coughing up brown, which is the dust. It think these weather patterns are affecting people in this way and making us more susceptible.

They scheduled me for a pneumonia and flue shot in the hospital without asking me. Thank goodness I was awake to turn it down, as I was paralyzed from a flu shot in the past .

More cases of it though!! Also in my family who does not live with me there have been two cases last month.

reply to post by amatrine


Are you in the US?

yes it's odd, same story emerging everywhere I ask around about this pneumonia thing....

I really wonder if the amounts of people that have it is around the same each year and if this year is normal....

Pneumonia affects approximately 450 million people a year and results in about 4 million deaths (7% of the world's total)

Source

From my own personal experience of Pneumonia here in the UK, which I was hospitalized with for two weeks (10 years ago) AND only yesterday had to visit my local Medical Center to confirm I have a 'chest infection' in order to get some antibiotics for it.

10 years ago I had to see 4 Doctors in the space of a couple of days before the 4th one would admit me to hospital as someone with a life-threatening case of Pneumonia ( I had a extremely high temperature at the time), the other three Doctors all said I had a 'Chest Infection' of some kind and the antibiotics the first one prescribed me would clear it up.

Being diagnosed with a 'Chest Infection' which I would later come to know as a generic diagnosis that Doctors use to cover the following conditions:-

Upper respiratory tract infection
Lower respiratory tract infection
Bronchitis
Pneumonia
Pleurisy

Pneumonia - How do doctors diagnose pneumonia?

I suspect that the actual cases of Pneumonia is largely under-estimated by many factors. Since Pneumonia is difficult to be certain of from the patient's description of their symptoms and without blood and mucus tests from the lab at hand, the Doctor wont generally commit himself to a specific condition, hence the generic diagnosis of a 'chest infection'. Prescribing the patient with Amoxicillin for example (if they are not allergic to penicillin) is usually the first choice of antibiotics since it is quite versatile against many other bacterial infections effecting the lungs, respiratory system etc.

There are two main types of chest infections

acute bronchitis
pneumonia

'Acute' means that the infection is a short-lived, one-off illness.

The symptoms of acute bronchitis and pneumonia are similar, but pneumonia symptoms can often be more severe and need medical attention.

Source: NHS Chest infections

I suspect that many people may indeed have had Pneumonia but as far as they were aware of, it was simply stated that they had a 'chest infection' which their prescribed antibiotics would clear up in a matter of 4-5 days!.

reply to post by Freelancer


thanks for that reply

i was just reading up on the numbers as well and it baffled me that there are so many cases each year. Also the death rate seems to be very very high, especially in children!
Different sites give different numbers though, varying from 175 k to 400 mil cases a year.. it's a bit confusing


I guess it's a coincidence then that I start seeing pneumonia cases all around me, while other years I don't.

One more thing that I get from your post though:
my doc listened to the chest and took temperature... there is no way he can say for sure that this is pneumonia.

Mm,that's funny I'm in Scotland and just today,since later this afternoon my chest has become sore and very raw along with my whole throat when I cough.

My chest is definetly congested.My chest not my throat.I'd put it down to a chest infection rather than pneumonia.No fever as such.

It's probably the weather which has ranged between -10 and 3 over the last week.Around -3 the last couple of days but with a very damp dense mist hanging clinging to everything the last few days.

All the same it's been 6 or 7 years since I've had anything like it.

reply to post by fastbob72


Scarey thing, is after bring in hospital, ,my fever is back today. Do not want to spend Christmas back in there

My sister was taken to the hospital recently because of a seizure of some sort. They did all kinds of tests on her and she found out that she has diabetes that she was unaware of and also that she had something called "walking pneumonia," whatever that is. She had no symptoms like the fever, coughing, trouble breathing, chest pain, etc.

I find it interesting that they found that when she apparently had no symptoms. I think they found it with x-ray.

Okay, I just looked it up. It means pneumonia with little or no symptoms because it is not very severe. Hence, you can walk around without knowing you have it. They say it doesn't require antibiotics. Also, it comes on very gradually and not very strong.

thanks for the replies

3rd day with fever today.
To me this feels more like a common flu and not pneumonia. I'm not taking the antibiotics at this point.
Other years I manage to help myself with my own herbal remedies and they seem to be working with the coughing now as well.

My husband is doing better by now, he is taking antibiotics.... and my daughter didn't get sick at all.