don't panic, but "SWINE FLU COULD SPREAD GLOBALLY"

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/25/swine.flu/index.html

Scary scary.

OMIGOD REMEMBER WHEN MAD COW WAS GOING TO KILL US ALL???

HOW COULD YOU FORGET THE BIRD FLU

nooooe
why the piggieeees
me need bacooooon daily likeeeee

don't worry,you could still eat it.the infection is from other persons who got it...

You people are too used to having epidemiologists save your bacon when it comes to preventing epidemics. Consequently you are more clueless than you realize.

Swine flu is utterly nasty stuff that can easily kill the weak and the old and make the young and hale feel like death warmed over. And it can spread like nobody's business. In the third world especially this could be bad, bad, bad news.

Read The Great Influenza, about the 1919 flu epidemic, if you want a bit of insight into influenza and its capacity to kill. That flu strain could kill a healthy, straping young adult less than 24 hours from the onset of symptoms!

i hope this will make people stop fronting with this whole OMG I LOVE BACON shit nowadays

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/statements/2009/h1n1_20090425/en/index.html

It's H1N1, not good.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu

Those birds must be feeling pretty smug now.

the chirpy bitches

http://www.creators.com/comics/37/34366_image.gif

The first case was seen in Mexico on April 13. The outbreak coincided with the President Barack Obama’s trip to Mexico City on April 16. Obama was received at Mexico’s anthropology museum in Mexico City by Felipe Solis, a distinguished archeologist who died the following day from symptoms similar to flu, Reforma newspaper reported. The newspaper didn’t confirm if Solis had swine flu or not.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aEsNownABJ6Q&refer=worldwide

good movie plot

Swine flu is utterly nasty stuff that can easily kill the weak and the old

Fuck those guys imo

http://www.who.int/csr/swine_flu/swineflu_qanda_20090425.pdf

Yup, NV. Seriously, fuck infants, disgusting, weak little bastards that they are. Always crying over something. We should just kick them all to the curb and to hell with that noise.

This is Sparta, dude.

i didn't realize the virus has already spread to the US...

u can catch it from the internet

xpost

UK radio is running a story tonite that a member of British Airways cabin crew has contracted it whilst back here. Obviously I'm ignoring this story as I'm a nasty kinderphobic bigot.

Sorry, contracted it in either Mexico or the US but then developed the symptoms whilst back here.

Most of Mexico’s dead were young, healthy adults, and none were over 60 or under 3 years old, the World Health Organization said. That alarms health officials because seasonal flus cause most of their deaths among infants and bedridden elderly people, but pandemic flus — like the 1918 Spanish flu, and the 1957 and 1968 pandemics — often strike young, healthy people the hardest.

hopefully this will mean the end of wkd's marketing campaign

Don't get why nobody ever points out that medicine was not awesome in 1918.

Got that pandemic!

also this:
A British Airways cabin crew staff member is being treated in a London hospital with "flu-like symptoms" after arriving on a flight from Mexico City, health officials said Saturday
The Health Protection Agency stressed he was undergoing tests "as a precautionary measure," adding there are no confirmed cases of human swine flu in Britain or Europe.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gzCWv4j9VeAlnz_8j236JDWc2ujg

ditto standards of quarantine, general health vigilance etc xxp

The outbreak coincided with the President Barack Obama’s trip to Mexico City on April 16.

Fucking thanks, Mr. Obama.

that's one way to improve unemployment numbers : \

yeah right, BLAME THE OBAMA PIG

http://www.northstarwriters.com/brettnoelimages/05March2009cartoonpage.jpg

I heard FDR was a communist.

just waiting for the outbreak of guano-spread flu and the resulting batshit cartoons

NV, you are right that medicine is now more capable than in 1918. But pandemics of highly infectious diseases are still not easy to contain without resorting to the same sorts of crowd dispersal and quarantine methods they used back then.

This shit does not have a magic bullet. Mass vaccination is not as simple as all that. In advanced countries many lives could be saved by prompt resort to intensive intervention, where available. But the worst menace is in countries without the medical resources of the wealthy countries, or in the remote rural areas of places like the USA.

I keep misreading porcine as porcupine :-/

i bet you my bottom dollar there's at least one girl in France named Porcine

Aimless I understand and respect that a disease like this is mostly a threat to developing nations or whatever euphemism we choose to adopt, if I have a bone to pick it's the fact that Western news outlets don't/won't write the story from that angle.

Don't get why nobody ever points out that medicine was not awesome in 1918.

― Eugenecist Levy (Noodle Vague), Saturday, April 25, 2009 6:39 PM (18 minutes ago) Bookmark

btw this has not a lot to do w/the dynamics of viral pandemics

I guess I'm thinking more of the general well-being of working class people in rich countries between 1918 and 2009 but it will be interesting to see if this ever plays itself out. Also a reading of previous ILX "We're All Going To Die" threads is instructive here I think.

i mean, i ~think~ i know what you're driving at, but w/r/t a viral flu pandemic, the only thing that the "general well-being" of working class people might have to do with preventing a pandemic is how it affects their immune systems response. the healthcare apparatus can try and deploy touch-and-go prophylactic vaccines and some antiviral drugs (which, it should be noted, do not "cure" the illness or reduce infectivity), but i'm not sure how the general well-being of the western working-class will have any effect on the spread of an airborne virus.

were we all so bad off in 1918 that everyone, including the young and healthy, was immunocompromised?? srs question!

I don't know about the States, but in the UK the diet of working class people was fucking terrible, in terms of inadequacy of calories consumed and general lack of vitamins and other important stuff. So bad in fact that WWII rationing pretty much massively improved the diet of most of our country. Now I guess you're saying that these things don't affect how a virus spreads, but I'm thinking that what will be different now is the immune systems. Which won't stop the illness spreading but could significantly dent the number of fatalities - caveat again - in the developed world.

well yeah that's what i'm wondering. was everyone so malnourished back then that their immune systems were depressed? sounds like maybe!

which then leads me to wonder: is this whole 'the young and healthy' were hit especially hard just a statistical misinterpretation? like, on a normal distribution, most people are not-elderly or infantile, and not ailing or in esp rude health! so basically pandemics ~by their very nature~ will appear to hit the young and healthy the hardest, because they're pretty much the bulk of the population!

Also wondering if young and health = more likely to spend time out and about where flu might be caught.

Mexico's over-65s make up approximately 6 percent of that country as opposed to 12 percent in the US and 16 percent in the UK so that must bend the curve somewhat.

Also wondering if young and health = more likely to spend time out and about where flu might be caught.

― eggy mule (Hurting 2), Saturday, April 25, 2009 7:30 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

good point.

if this gets into the prison system, it will shred them to bits :(

just waiting for the outbreak of guano-spread flu and the resulting batshit cartoons

― sorry for british (country matters), Saturday, April 25, 2009 11:48 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

^^^ underrated post

maybe we should let all the other things that are supposed to kill us actually work their magic before gettin all worked up over this one

who's worked up

Okay my enemies, get to killing me.

maybe we should let all the other things that are supposed to kill us actually work their magic before gettin all worked up over this one

Funny you should mention that. Here in South Florida, we have an unexplained outbreak of deadly meningitis.

Yeah, expect to be on your back for a week at least. I don't know if I had the piggy variety, but it was all I could do to get up and use the toilet when I was down.

i'd really rather it not hit me at all obviously but i want to be ready just in case, and i really don't want to still be dealing with it by the weekend if i can help it. i've been looking forward to this weekend for a couple months!

gonna take bedridden time as an opportunity for meditation i guess. "if you have time to breathe, you have time to meditate."

every muscle ache and stomach twist is making me go "hmmmm" right now. hoping for the best.

OK this has been said one trillion times already but I still absolutely cannot get my head around parents who somehow think Jenny Mcarthy has more credibility than, like, people with actual expertise in this stuff???? WTF america, good luck.

Oh and my favorite bit of science communications these past few days is the very effective bit about flu vaccine containing less mercury than your average can of tuna fish.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1934826,00.html?cnn=yes

thank you, Time Magazine, for your v. insightful story

H1N1 is a combination of influenza strains; one part originated in pigs, and another in birds. So far, only swine and ferrets, which are particularly susceptible to the flu, have become infected with H1N1.(See a photoessay about animal space travelers.)

WTF AT THAT LAST PARENTHETICAL

WHY YES I DO WANT TO READ ABOUT ANIMALS IN SPACE

The first one is pretty random, too:

Late last week, when the cat came down with flu-like symptoms — malaise, loss of appetite — its owners brought it to Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine for treatment. The family mentioned to the vet that they had also recently battled illness, which led to testing the pet for H1N1. (See a photoessay on rescued stray dogs giving back.)

how do you tell if a cat has malaise???? "My cat is somehow even lazier than before."

vaccinated this morning iirc

What, you woke up randomly outside a clinic and figured you were vaccinated?

The Today Show had a total hatemongering story about how Wall Street companies are receiving allotments of the H1N1 vaccination this morning; it was kind of stunning in its level of bias and downright hateful assumptions. (Basically, it was excoriating these companies for receiving vaccinations that were offered to them by the government and stopped just short of baldly stating that absolutely no high-risk ppl work for any Wall Street banks; this was followed up by a doctor who basically said, "Well, following the rules makes them look terrible and they should have donated all of their doses to my hospital.")

I sort of thought I was watching Fox News as it was going on.

i think i now hate anti-vaccine people now more than i hate anyone, and yes that includes Osama Bin Laden

They stopped just short of "REMEMBER THOSE WALL STREET BASTARDS WHO STOLE ALL YOUR MONEY? WELL NOW THEY'RE STEALING YOUR VACCINES!" It was kind of incredible.

There is this guy who keeps calling here demanding to know why we're keeping information about when MA will receive more vaccines a secret and not telling anyone. He's a huge conspiracy theorist. I actually hung up on him yesterday because he started cursing at me. ugh.

tell him that agents will deliver the vaccine to his house and that he should check under the cushions in his couch every day for the next 2 weeks

He has called so many times that when he called yesterday I was actually said to him "Oh hello we spoke the other day because I recognize your voice and your frequent and persistant use of the word "secret".

Tomorrow is my last day here. If he calls maybe I will do just that Dan.

Ned that is what happened!

ENBB I think you should tell this caller about gbx's mystical experience and how it changed his life.

i think i now hate anti-vaccine people now more than i hate anyone, and yes that includes Osama Bin Laden

― TGAAPQ (Mr. Que), Thursday, November 5, 2009 7:32 PM (44 minutes ago)

^^^this

If the guy calls again, just tell him he's already been given his shot and see how he reacts.

I work at a hospital and the number of inpatients with flu-like symptoms has dropped off fairly substantially, in the last few weeks. One would hope that this could be a sign that we're coming down from the first peak (at least in Oregon).

Yeah, it's the second wave I'm more concerned about at this point -- anecdotally there seem to be a lot less under the weather folks around here than last month.

I got to give a whole bunch of H1N1 vaccines over the weekend. If you give shots you get one for free at the end!

Best part: actually getting a couple of people who were looking away, bracing for the pain, and then turned around after they heard the needle go into the sharps bucket, like, "That's it?"

Worst part (1): telling an 8 year old girl that it totally wouldn't hurt, and then for the only time ever putting the needle in and hitting the bone (which hurts). So I am a liar and a bad person, and I totally jinxed myself.

Worst part (2): giving the shot to small kids, since they can't understand you when you tell them to look away, so they watch you bring the needle up and could not hate you less, until the needle goes in and then they immediately burst into tears. Especially when they are younger than 2 or 3, when you have to give the shot in their leg instead of their arm. It is a good way to feel like a bad person for making a child cry.

awwwwww

*could not hate you MORE.

(I am starting to believe that medical school erodes your ability to use the English language properly.)

My kids cry for, like, 10 seconds, then light up when they get a lollipop. Then they spend the rest of the day skipping around, singing about their shot, and showing off their band aid.

^^^ i also did this

This is in Belgian papers as "whole Alaskan island has the flu"

http://www.adn.com/swineflu/story/1003193.html

http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=65.757887,-168.950028&spn=0.003322,0.013937&t=h&z=17

(click "map" to make it disappear btw)

Is it just the US thats being hit hard with this? it doesnt seem to be rating much of a mention in Aus anymore and I dont know anyone much who's been genuinely sick (there were some people who went "oh no i have the flu" and were back at work fine 3 days later so theres no way they had h1n1).

Aus as in Australia? It's not flu season there anymore. In fact, this year's seasonal U.S. flu strain - the one they target with the seasonal flu vaccine - originated in Melbourne, way back when.

Oh ok - I would have thought flu strains were global these days what with air travel and such, but fair enough.

On the down side, we just met someone whose friend's five-year old son died two weeks ago of asthma aggravated by H1N1.

^^^^very sad, and drives home the importance of immunizing children, especially those at high risk for pulmonary crises.

Wow, very sad.

Doctor confirmed last week that I didn't have it, but the lurgey I did suffer with still left me feeling like crap for more than a week.

whatever the fuck I've got is driving me fucking crazy

no fever but so fucking tired all day

Hello, SFT.

Include me into yr portal!

I phoned the info line, and the symptoms list was "Temperature", plus one of the following. etc etc.

Have to say, if I had to choose two I had to have, I got the right ones. Sore throat, runny nos, dry coff.

You can keep the listless/tired, and the Diar/Vom.

I went to bed at 11:00pm, and woke at 01:00 in a damn swimming pool of my own making!

How long does it go on?

nhs just gave me that "you may have this don't leave the house if possible" thing....

flatmate's reaction was as if i'd invited my buddy swine flu over for a party and we were both having a fucking amazing laugh.

my pal has it, even after the vaccine

only plus is I guess work will tell me to stay at home all week and I'm on a really boring shift for next 5 days

fucking hell this is a rough flu now....jesus.

My sympathies. Hang in there. Your immune system will see you through this.

thanks! yeah for sure...I'm feeling this prob is swine, just based on severity. never known a flu to get markedly worse after having it for four days, sweating like a racehorse...urgh.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/0114/1224262291929.html

THE WORLD Health Organisation is to examine its handling of the swine flu pandemic after accusations that it exaggerated the dangers of the virus under pressure from drug companies.

i just got my vaccine. headache for a few hours afterward, but i think i'm fine now.

just got my vaccine. autistic for a few hours afterwards, but i think im fine now.

retardo maxelban

thank god jenny mccarthy cured max of his autism

how you feeling ronan?