Swine flu is a virus. just like seasonal flu. just like the common cold. The only difference is that swine flu sucks dick right now. There's not really much you can do to prevent it. Washing your hands and covering your cough and things like that can help, but since it's already in the states there's nothing that we can do to stop it here. [Whoever it was] Suggesting we close the fucking borders is ridiculous. Forcing people to check into a hospital once they arrive is insane. ARE YOU KIDDING!? Wearing a paper mask isn't going to stop the flu from getting to here any more than closing the border is.

Chances are you might get swine flu. Just wash your hands, cover your cough and all that. If you get the flu, go to the doctor. Or should we just shut down the world and start running around in HAZMAT suits? Yea, that's what I thought. Calm down people.

No no... I think you had a point there...... shut down the world...... AND START RUNNING AROUND IN HAZMAT SUITS! YES! I totally endorse this.

Over here it's been on the news channels non-stop. It makes me giggle. They go on for hours about it and then at the end they say "No need to panic." Hmm, yeah, like that wasn't their intention at all. Cue every hyperchondriac in the world running to the emergency room everytime they get a bogie.

Oh.. and can anyone tell me the difference between a pandemic and an epidemic? I'm confused about that bit.

A pandemic is a world wide outbreak of a virus or disease. An epidemic is an outbreak of a virus/disease in a region. If this thing stays mostly contained in Mexico it's an epidemic, but if it were to spread rapidly all over the world it would be a pandemic.

It's a strain of the flu.

Just another to add to the list.

Woopy fucking doo.

God people are so crazy! What are you going to do if a kid comes near you that has the measles? Shut down the damn suburb you're in?

I love the way people sensationalise things!

I agree with my Genes!

I agree that it's really just a bunch of hype. I saw an article where in Egypt the killed all their farm pigs and there hasn't even been a case there! It's crazy. Plus all the deaths have been in Mexico (the child that died in Texas was not a US citizen but a Mexican boy that came to the US for medical help). It's crazy.

I think I want porkchops for dinner.

my collegued said to me today that in the bible man created the world, man will also destroy it. At the end of the day its flu. some will get it, some wont. we will just have to wait and see.

A joke my mate sent.

Bored on the way to work? On the bus, tube or train, pretend to be on the phone, talk about your trip to mexico. Hang up and sneeze! tee hee!

the reason people are going so crazy about this is there is no Vaccine. There is no way to prevent this, you just have to wash your hands and hope and pray you dont get sick. The highest people at risk for death have no protection. My mother in law is walking around in a mask because if she gets sick she doesnt have a strong enough immune system to fight it. 2 cases have been confirmed today in Colorado http://www.denverpost.com/ci_12262927

The majority of people who pass this won't get any more sick than they would with ordinary flu. It's an inconvenience, not a reason to panic. The only people really at risk of dying are those who have underlying health problems, like diabetes or asthma. And there's no evidence that masks provide any protection whatsoever.

As for your mother in law... if she's got other health problems then she's just as at risk of dying from ordinary flu... so does she walk about wearing a mask every winter?

And even the vaccines we have for ordinary flu aren't always reliable, as it depends on the strain of flu.

IT'S HYPE, YO. MORE PEOPLE DIE FROM ORDINARY FLU. AND THEY HAVE PLENTY OF DRUGS TO TREAT THIS SWINE FLU, EVEN THOUGH NO VACCINE. THERE IS NO REASON FOR PANIC IN ANY CASE. PANIC IS TOTALLY COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE. IF YOU DIE, YOU DIE, YO. BUT IF YOU STRESS AND WORRY ABOUT IT, YOU'RE ACTUALLY MORE LIKELY TO DIE, BECAUSE YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM PLUMMETS.

yep! YO!

Well said! Bloody media hype! I love how everyone is buying into it though.

I was on the BBC Have Your Say site the other day and all these uneducated idiots were saying things such as, 'Ooh now you meat eaters are paying!' and 'I always said it was best to be vegetarian!'
Vegetable murdering evidently rots your brain!

I got this from a friend of mine and I thought I'd pass it along. It explains why the "panic" about this particular "bug"

=======================

So, I was talking to a friend of mine who is in the medical field, and he explained "WHY" there is so much "hype" it's because this is the same strain from the 1918/1919 flu pandemic, and although medical has advanced incredibly, they don't have a vaccine for this particular strain. What happened in 1918 is that it showed up in about March/April in... Read More a few areas, then it sat dorment until Dec. 1918 and then thousands of people got it, MILLIONS of people, and they couldn't contain it. That is their concern is that it will turn into a pandemic this next winter. The reason it has gone up in phases so quickly is because of the amount of Countries it is now in. It has nothing to do with how many people in the US have it, but that there are more countries than Mexico and with the amount of travel that everyone does, it's going to be carried much easier and much more quickly. Even with the anti viral shots they have, there are "tiers" on who gets them first, second, third etc. this strain of flu attacks the healthy, mostly people between the ages of 15-45, which is what happened in 1918/19.

Good thing this is 2009 and not 1918/19. I think that we have advanced greatly since then. I know you said that in your post, but I just thought I would say it again for those who seem to pick out the negative in articles and not completly read the whole thing.

Exactly. I'd also like to think we've come a long way since 1918/19. It isn't containable at this point. The only way to "contain" it would be to lock everyone away in their homes until no one was sick anymore. Is that going to happen? No, didn't think so. Plus in 1918/19 I doubt they had the knowledge/means to come up with a vaccine, while there have been articles suggesting we could have a vaccine for this strain in as little as two months!

There was another bout of Swine Flu in 1976. Many people got it, but only one person died from it. All Government workers were required to get the vaccination. The vaccination was made and administered before other deaths occurred. I don't see why they can't get another vaccine out there before the numbers drastically increase. But, I have my theories on that one.

Lauren, I tried telling my mom the EXACT thing you just said. She shrugged me off but it's true. We have so many advances in medical technology and things are a lot different than they were back then. Also, I blame the media because of course they have to make everything into a bigger deal which is what they do but for crap's sake it's ridiculous. People need to relax a little!

And it's like I said in my response that is on what is currently page 7 of this thread, there was another bout of Swine Flu in 1976, and they popped out a vaccine for it quick enough that only one person died from it. Of course, the vaccine hurt more people than the flu itself killed, but hey...that was 1976, right?

I should have known it would post like that. Oh well.

It's okay, guys. Stephen Colbert can save us all and tell us what to do! :)

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30cEnemy Swine: A Pigcalypse Nowcolbertnation.comColbert Report Full EpisodesPolitical HumorFirst 100 Days

posting fail, lol. go here.

Swine flu may be less potent than first feared



The swine flu outbreak that has alarmed the world for a week now appears less ominous, with the virus showing little staying power in the hardest-hit cities and scientists suggesting it lacks the genetic fortitude of past killer bugs. President Barack Obama even voiced hope Friday that it may turn out to be no more harmful than the average seasonal flu.

In New York City, which has the most confirmed swine flu cases in the U.S. with 49, swine flu has not spread far beyond cases linked to one Catholic school. In Mexico, the epicenter of the outbreak, very few relatives of flu victims seem to have caught it.

A flu expert said he sees no reason to believe the virus is particularly lethal. And a federal scientist said the germ's genetic makeup lacks some traits seen in the deadly 1918 flu pandemic strain and the more recent killer bird flu.

Still, it was too soon to be certain what the swine flu virus will do. Experts say the only wise course is to prepare for the worst. But in a world that's been rattled by the specter of a global pandemic, glimmers of hope were more than welcome Friday.

"It may turn out that H1N1 runs its course like ordinary flus, in which case we will have prepared and we won't need all these preparations," Obama said, using the flu's scientific name.

The president stressed the government was still taking the virus very seriously, adding that even if this round turns out to be mild, the bug could return in a deadlier form during the next flu season.

New York officials said after a week of monitoring the disease that the city's outbreak gives little sign of spreading beyond a few pockets or getting more dangerous.

All but two of the city's confirmed cases so far involve people associated with the high school where the local outbreak began and where several students had recently returned from Mexico.

More than 1,000 students, parents and faculty there reported flu symptoms over just a few days last month. But since then, only a handful of new infections have been reported — only eight students since last Sunday.

Almost everyone who became ill before then are either recovering or already well. The school, which was closed this past week, is scheduled to reopen Monday. No new confirmed cases were identified in the city on Friday, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the outbreak in New York had so far proved to be "a relatively minor annoyance."

In Mexico, where swine flu has killed at least 15 people and the confirmed case count has surpassed 300, the health secretary said few of the relatives of 86 suspected swine flu patients had caught the virus. Only four of the 219 relatives surveyed turned up as probable cases.

As recently as Wednesday, Mexican authorities said there were 168 suspected swine flu deaths in the country and almost 2,500 suspected cases. The officials have stopped updating that number and say those totals may have even been inflated.

Mexico shut down all but essential government services and private businesses Friday, the start of a five-day shutdown that includes a holiday weekend. Authorities there will use the break to determine whether emergency measures can be eased.

In the Mexican capital, there were no reports of deaths overnight — the first time that has happened since the emergency was declared a week ago, said Mayor Marcelo Ebrard.

"This isn't to say we are lowering our guard or we think we no longer have problems," Ebrard said. "But we're moving in the right direction."

The U.S. case count rose to 155 on Friday, based on federal and state counts, although state laboratory operators believe the number is higher because they are not testing all suspected cases.

Worldwide, the total confirmed cases neared 600, although that number is also believed to be much larger. Besides the U.S. and Mexico, the virus has been detected in Canada, New Zealand, China, Israel and eight European nations.

There were still plenty of signs Friday of worldwide concern.

China decided to suspend flights from Mexico to Shanghai because of a case of swine flu confirmed in a flight from Mexico, China's state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

And in Hong Kong, hundreds of hotel guests and workers were quarantined after a tourist from Mexico tested positive for swine flu, Asia's first confirmed case.

Evoking the 2003 SARS outbreak, workers in protective suits and masks wiped down tables, floors and windows. Guests at the hotel waved to photographers from their windows.

Scientists looking closely at the H1N1 virus itself have found some encouraging news, said Nancy Cox, flu chief at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Its genetic makeup doesn't show specific traits that showed up in the 1918 pandemic virus, which killed about 40 million to 50 million people worldwide.

"However, we know that there is a great deal that we do not understand about the virulence of the 1918 virus or other influenza viruses" that caused serious illnesses, Cox said. "So we are continuing to learn."

She told The Associated Press that the swine flu virus also lacked genetic traits associated with the virulence of the bird flu virus, which grabbed headlines a few years ago and has killed 250 people, mostly in Asia.

Researchers will get a better idea of how dangerous this virus is over the next week to 10 days, said Peter Palese, a leading flu researcher with Mount Sinai Medical School in New York.

So far in the United States, he said, the virus appears to look and behave like the garden-variety flus that strike every winter. "There is no real reason to believe this is a more serious strain," he said.

Palese said many adults probably have immune systems primed to handle the virus because it is so similar to another common flu strain.

As for why the illness has predominantly affected children and teenagers in New York, Palese said older people probably have more antibodies from exposure to similar types of flu that help them fight off infection.

"The virus is so close," he said.

In the United States, most of the people with swine flu have been treated at home. Only nine people are known to have ended up in the hospital, though officials suspect there are more.

In Mexico, officials have voiced optimism for two days that the worst may be over. But Dr. Scott F. Dowell of the CDC said it's hard to know whether the outbreak is easing up in Mexico. "They're still seeing plenty of cases," Dowell said.

He said outbreaks in any given area might be relatively brief, so that they may seem to be ending in some areas that had a lot of illness a few weeks ago. But cases are occurring elsewhere, and national numbers in Mexico are not abating, he said.

A top Mexican medical officer questioned the World Health Organization's handling of the early signs of the swine flu scare, suggesting Thursday that a regional arm of the WHO had taken too long to notify WHO headquarters of about a unusually late rash of flu cases in Mexico.

The regional agency, however, provided a timeline to the AP suggesting it was Mexico that failed to respond to its request to alert other nations to the first hints of the outbreak.

The Mexican official, chief epidemiologist Dr. Miguel Angel Lezana, backtracked Friday, telling Radio Formula: "There was no delay by the Mexican authorities, nor was there any by the World Health Organization."

In the U.S., Obama said efforts were focused on identifying people who have the flu, getting medical help to the right places and providing clear advice to state and local officials and the public.

The president also said the U.S. government is working to produce a vaccine down the road, developing clear guidelines for school closings and trying to ensure businesses cooperate with workers who run out of sick leave.

He pointed out that regular seasonal flus kill about 36,000 people in the United States in an average year and send 200,000 to the hospital.

___

Associated Press writers Malcolm Ritter in New York, Lauran Neergaard in Washington, and Paul Haven, E. Eduardo Castillo, Andrew O. Selsky and Istra Pacheco in Mexico City contributed to this report.