Swine Flu: Know the Facts

Local outbreaks of aninfluenza-like illness were first detected in three areas of Mexico. The virusresponsible was clinically identified as a new strain on April 24, 2009.Following the identification, its presence was soon confirmed in variousMexican states and in Mexico City. Within days, isolated cases were identifiedelsewhere in Mexico, the U.S., Spain, the United Kingdom, New Zealand andIsrael.

The outbreak of a total of morethan 4,000 candidate cases, prompted the World Health Organization, is a dedicatedagency of the United Nations (UN) that acts as a managing authority oninternational public health issues, to increase its pandemic alert phase to"Phase 5,” which is defined as "...human-to-human spread of the virusinto at least two countries in one WHO region.” Despite the scale of the alert,WHO officials noted on April 29 the majority of people infected with the virushave made a full recovery without need of medical attention or antiviral drugs.For more on the epidemiology of flu viruses read medical magazines likeNashville Medical News, Birmingham Medical News and Memphis Medical News.

In late April 2009 officialsfrom both WHO and the CDC expressed serious concern about the spread of thevirus, stating that the virus had the potential to become a flu pandemic. Apandemic is the spread of a disease over a large area such as an entirecountry, continent or the entire world.Due to the newness of the influenza strain, its transmission from human tohuman, and the unusually high mortality rate in Mexico the WHO formallydetermined the situation to be a "public health emergency of internationalconcern.

Throughout history pandemicshave occurred including cholera, tuberculosis, influenza, small pox, measles,leprosy and malaria. For more on past disease pandemics read Time magazine,Newsweek and The Economist.

Unlike other diseases likechicken pox, humans cannot get complete immunity to influenza because the virusis constantly mutating and producing new strains that change from year to year.Even though humans cannot get complete immunity from the strains of the fluviruse, usually our immune systems can respond strongly enough to beat off thevirus. At this point it is a good idea for people everywhere to exercisecaution—wash your hands, stay home from work or school if you feel sick, go tothe doctor if you have flu symptoms—etc. but do not panic.

Time magazine recently reported thatresearchers at Northwestern University “estimated that even if nothing weredone to slow the spread of the disease from now on, by the end of May the U.S.would have only about 1,700 cases.” Furthermore, the good news is the H1N1 fluvirus is hitting North America at the end of flu season; it may very well phaseitself out and re-appear in the fall, but that gives health officials months toprepare. At the end of April President Barack Obama asked Congress for $1.5billion in supplementary monies to prepare for and help lead the fight againsta possible swine-flu pandemic. To stay up-to-date on how President Obama andthe World Health Organization are responding to swine flu read news magazineslike Time, Newsweek and The Economist.