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Something like 36,000 people every die from complications of the regular flu.
And yet no one is freaking out.
"The WHO's "Phases of Pandemic Alert," which has been in existence for five years, characterizes phase 5 as a human-to-human spread of the virus into at least two countries in one WHO region, which signals that a pandemic is imminent."
While 'level 5' sounds nice and scary, all it really means is that it has moved from one country to two other nearby countries, and been confirmed by doctors to have done so.
@nakedscience: That's irrelevant. The issue is that there is POTENTIAL for a pandemic flu to kill far more people than a regular seasonal flu. It's not doing that yet, but they are afraid that it could.
One of my coworker's daughters was exposed to someone who had it and is currently feeling ill. Now my coworker's not allowed to come to work.
@PipeRifle: Yeah. It's too bad the news doesn't downplay this, and makes it sound like it's the black plague all over again.
Permission to panic?!
You know who's not worried about it? Me. I don't mean to sound terribly flippant but I don't respond well to fear tactics or fear messages.
If I feel ill, I will definitely seek medical attention ASAP. Until then, I will keep on truckin.
@Vanilla5: Right on, I totally agree. If I go to some "flu" it better be a cross-breed of a flu by some more violent and deadly animal.
No joke. Where is the Tiger-flu, Cougar-flu, Black bear-flu...
Heck Im just watching out for ol Flagg.
Does it go all the way to 11?
@nakedscience: 36K die each year in the US alone and that's with vaccines, and previous exposure immunity in parts of the population. This new "Mexican Flu", it's not a swine flu, is a franken-flu composed of swine, bird, and human flu strains that has never been seen before.
The "potential" is glaringly obvious.
@PipeRifle: A 6-point scale isn't exactly standard anywhere in the world is it? You would think they would make this a little more intuitive.
@johnva: There is POTENTIAL for a lot of stuff...earthquakes, floods, alien invasions, zombies...no one is having a fit about that stuff. Where are we on the Zombie Scale?
Between my classes at community college and retail job, im boned.Time to eat salad and stock up on some OJ...
I love the panic mode for this one... though I must say, this does hit a little closer to home than avian flu. Think about it... the regular flu KILLS 250,000 - 300,000 ANNUALLY. Panicky yet? I hate news sources cuz they have nothing better to do than make bold panicky headlines to get readers (I'm looking at you CNN).
@Canino: Somewhere between Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead I think. /me grips shotgun tighter.
My wife and 1 & 5 month old baby are visting family in mexico right now, they are leaving on the 4th though and niether are sick yet.
Mexico was making all the drug and tourism money, and sending too many people over the border, so the rest of the world invented "Swine Flu" and shot those cheeky bastards down hard :P
I hope you could realize that I'm kidding up there, but if you can't, I was.
Swine Flu seems -vastly- blown out of proportion, just like Bird Flu and Mad Cow disease and SARS and...
It's just another news story. People get sick and die. There are rare and frightening diseases out there, that can spread rapidly. It's sad, but it's just a fact of life. One death (of a young person with a more susceptible immune system, no less)in the US is terribly sad, but it's not an excuse to just panic all willy nilly.
@nakedscience: The other thing to keep in mind is that many of the people who "normally" die from the flu are the elderly, the sick, and the very young, i.e, people who have weakened/undeveloped immune systems. Pandemic flu tends to kill the middle aged and the healthy--many people killed by this thing so far in Mexico are in that scary 20-40 age bracket that epidemiologists hate to see getting killed. The Spanish flu in 1918 killed healthy people because it attacked their respiratory systems, which were strong and thus, paradoxically, better able to help it move into their system.
I'm usually the first one in my family panicking. Not so much this time. I don't know what it is, but I have NOT been able throw myself into panic-mode about this.
Maybe it's because it's the flu? I've had the flu before. Everyone except for one person in our family of four has had the flu. We didn't pass on. I WANTED to throw myself outta the basement window once or twice while I was sick with the flu, but I survived!
Their description of the Swine Flu sounds like the FLU flu. I sure as hell hope we don't get it, but I'm unable to hit the red button yet.
OH! University of Delaware is 25 minutes away... they have 10 probable cases. I AM waiting to hear if those students are sick. Then... MAYBE. :)
I feel like mass hysteria is starting to set in for me.
My left hand is trembling.
Lets hope that this doesn't cut too much into sales of Baconnaise.
I'm surprised the rabid Xtians haven't started their usual 'End Times' drumbeat yet again.
..Or the Nostradamus 'experts' attempting to backfit yet another quatrain into current events.
..And wouldn't it be seriously funny if'n all those wondrously accurate psychics were to catch this stuff and--in unison--expire with the statement "Didn't see that coming?"
@nakedscience: Go read up on the 1918 flu pandemic. The initial wave was rather tame. The second and third wave as the flu mutated and became stronger was when the real tragedy and death started.
In two weeks, there have been 152 deaths in Mexico that are suspected or confirmed to have been caused by swine flu. At least fifty of those were in Mexico City, which has a population of 8 million people.
The number that I heard for annual flu deaths was 40,000 a year in the U.S., which has a population of 303 million people. My calculations came out that a city the size of Mexico city should have ~20 deaths average per week from the flu, which at the very least means that they are currently a bit higher than average. But at least here we are out of flu season, and it looks like Mexico should be out as well, so flu related deaths should be going down, not up.
@Maglet: Some of the symptoms are just like the typical influenza A strains that go around in the winter. This one is different because it causes cytokine storms where your immune system ends up killing you while fighting off the virus.
It basically turns a healthy immune system on its head.
I understand people wanting to laugh this off because CNN goes into panic mode about everything. But this certainly does have the potential to get really ugly in the right set of circumstances.
Oh, those media scare tactics.
This seems like a smoke screen to me. I wonder what the government and the bankers are up to.
@bohemian:
Sure it can. That goes without saying (so, I thought). But, as it stands right now... nuh-uh. It's pinged my radar, sure. But no panic. YET. Like I said, I'm usually all about panic. :)
I like how they use the old "take this very seriously" about half way down that story
@nakedscience: Allow me to explain: A viral pandemic is defined as when there is the risk of a large number of persons becomming infected by a virus which there is no viable prevention, vaccination, or cure for. For example, if H1N1 was to spread and infect a small town, it would be considered a pandemic. The fact that it has already spread across the world is another factor. Now the trouble is finding patient zero.
For a slightly better, yet completely unrealistic example, the T Virus was considered a pandemic.
@vdragonmpc: The irony in that is that Tiger Influenza actually does exist...
So does Horse Influenza...
@Wombatish: Except that Bovine Spongiform Encephalopatht is very much real, as is H1N1, H5N1, and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.
As for the last part, I wouldn't call it a panic yet... But definitely easing into a controlled frenzy.
Just keep your hands clean and stay home if you feel sick, so you don't spread it if you have it and don't catch it when your immune system is down if you don't.
If you do get sick, the article I read said to call your doctor before you go in, and take any advice they give you. It may not be it.
Don't worry. *pat pat*
2009: The year that bacon struck back.