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Daylife/AP Photo used by permission
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| Entering the General Hospital in Mexico City |
Mexican officials, scrambling to control a swine flu outbreak that has killed at least 16 people and possibly dozens more in recent weeks, shuttered schools from kindergarten to university for millions of young people in and around the capital on Friday and urged people with flu symptoms to stay home from work.
”We’re dealing with a new flu virus that constitutes a respiratory epidemic that so far is controllable,” Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova told reporters late Thursday, after huddling with President Felipe Calderón and other top officials. He said the virus had mutated from pigs and had at some point been transmitted to humans.
Mexico’s flu season is usually over by now, but health officials have noticed a significant spike in flu cases. The World Health Organization reported about 800 cases of flu-like symptoms in Mexico in recent weeks, most of them among healthy young adults, with 57 deaths in Mexico City and 3 in the central part of the country. Mexican officials confirmed 16 deaths from swine flu, and said another 45 were under investigation…
The WHO and the CDC now consider all 60 deaths as likely swine flu.
Health officials in the United States were working to determine whether the Mexican outbreak was tied to the unusual strain of swine flu that has been circulating among people in the American Southwest but is not known to have caused any deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The agency, which has found only seven cases in the United States, expects to find more now that it has begun looking intensively for them…
Dr. Cox of the disease control center said officials did not yet know whether the flu shot this year protected against the new swine strain.
Well, I had my flu shot and I’m still nervous. 
No flu shot will prevent you from getting this.
Why is this strain of flu popping up like this? That the hell is going on?
Its a good thing we have control of our borders well enough to keep this thing from spreading into our country.
(yes I’m being sarcastic)
Heh. Whenever I hear a disease being called some kind of (Animal) Flu, I recall the Ricky Gervais joke about the first guy to catch AIDS. Youtube doesn’t work for me at work so you’ll need to google it yourself, but it’s quite funny.
Let me guess, Mexifornia? South, down near the border?
You don’t need an ‘insurgency’ if you can brew up something like this.
Where do you buy surgical masks? How about renting a room on the space station until this thing evolves into something less lethal?
3 cheers for factory farming.
the world is a boat that we are all in we must help each other if we are to survive
Blame the Chinese, not Mexico. Every flu known has come from China, due to their farm animal raising practices.
Flu virus are able to mutate. The more you get people mixing and going to work sick, and, in this case, probably going to work at a PIG FARM ill (pigs can get human flu via contact with humans, and pigs can give pig flu to humans). In this case, something mutated, and now this particular pig flu strain can be transferred among people — nice trick.
It doesn’t ALWAYS happen in China #7. It’s just in China it’s common practice to keep poultry (think avian flu) with pigs (swine flu) and have people working with both. Actually, ducks are responsible for most of the influenza distribution, usually. The flu season migrates typically with the birds.
HOWEVER this is really serious! We have no immunity to this virus, and right now they say it’s not that virulent, but all it needs to do is gain that ability….and we’re looking at a pandemic. The economic stresses also lower immunity….so, a PERFECT STORM.
With all the cross-border travel, and with the densely populated areas on both sides of the border….it’s going to spread. The only “lucky” thing would be for a nice hot spell…because influenza does better in cold, wet wintery weather, although, this one may be different.
I for one, am concerned, seriously.
Stock up on food then stay home with the door locked for a few months. Maybe it will go away?
Oh, that isn’t very practical.
Buy a plot just in case?
Take care of youself and get on with life? I guess that’s about it.
The problem is real but solutions are hard to come by.
I remember getting a swine flu vaccination from the local health department back in the 70s. Shortly thereafter someone stopped the immunizations because some people were getting Reyes’ Syndrome from it. I never had any problems, but have no idea whether I’m immune to this version of swine flu or not…
Already 9 cases confirmed in Texas.
Now we know why the chicken crossed the road. So the avian flu virus could jump the species barrier, of course!
Some of the sisters I work with are real pigs and I’m not sick yet. Well – physically. I’m not suffering from mental illness, I kind of enjoy it.
One thing’s for sure, people look like Michael Jackson here in Mexico
My wife and I get our flu shots every year. Last year we both also got the anti-pneumonia shot. Then we both came down with some awful long-lasting crud, and hers developed into pneumonia. 2007/8/9 nowhere near my list of favorite years. (Except for the election.)
And, yes, I do think the strained economy is a factor…
We will still get our flu shots every year though, and take our chances with everyone else.
sounds like bio-event predicted for the summer.
so far the CDC says “it contains DNA from avian, swine and human viruses, including elements from European and Asian swine viruses, the CDC has said”
(reuters)
we had 60+ kids sent home from school on thursday in Queens, NY complaining of shortness of breath, ringing in the ears and lung pain. -they’re being tested..
no doubt they’ll try and and pass this off as naturally occurring.
CDC says 70% ethanol, 5% Lysol or 10% bleach is sufficient to disinfect it..
well, at least we know FEMA has plenty of caskets handy to bury us in.. :p
as long as it’s a single celled virus, a sonic nebulizer and some silver colloid will probably be the best defense against it. -fill a nose spray inhaler if you have to do it on the cheap.
personally, i wouldn’t take any vaccine that suddenly appears.. back in ’76 they had a swine flu scare (fort Dix) and the vaccine they rushed out paralyzed some 800-900 people iirc.
given the multiple gene set this thing has,
anything they put out will only be for profit.
stay away from public phone.
gentleman, start your caskets…
-s
#10
no no no, in the 1976 “swine flu” vaccine, people ended up getting Guillain-Barre Syndrome, not Reyes. Reyes is a problem in children, because of a reaction between a virus and the body’s reaction to asprin. It’s why you’re cautioned to NOT give children asprin for cold or flu.
And, no, this version of “swine flu” is a totally different strain than those that have been seen before. No one has immunity. It’s how epidemics and pandemics happen.
Just remember in the 1917 Influenza Pandemic it was estimated that from 1917-1919 more than 50 million people died, and ONE THIRD of the world’s population was affected. Most of the fatalities were healthy young adults, and children. It was a very unique virus, and very virulent.
The people who study such things fear most (and those people who read about such things) another 1917-18 style pandemic. Even though we have modern antiviral and antibacterial drugs, vaccines, and prevention knowledge, the return of a pandemic virus like the 1917 one, would likely kill >100 million people worldwide.
I thought this article pulled the relevant concerns together quite well:
http://newscientist.com/article/dn17025-deadly-new-flu-virus-in-us-and-mexico-may-go-pandemic.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news
Its a good thing Janet Napolitano became Director of Homeland Security, stopping the flood of people into the country…from Canada…and so the possible spread of this disease…
# 17 meetsy said, on April 25th, 2009 at 12:40 am
#10
no no no, in the 1976 “swine flu” vaccine, people ended up getting Guillain-Barre Syndrome, not Reyes. Reyes is a problem in children, because of a reaction between a virus and the body’s reaction to asprin. It’s why you’re cautioned to NOT give children asprin for cold or flu.
And, no, this version of “swine flu” is a totally different strain than those that have been seen before. No one has immunity. It’s how epidemics and pandemics happen.
Just remember in the 1917 Influenza Pandemic it was estimated that from 1917-1919 more than 50 million people died, and ONE THIRD of the world’s population was affected. Most of the fatalities were healthy young adults, and children. It was a very unique virus, and very virulent.
The people who study such things fear most (and those people who read about such things) another 1917-18 style pandemic. Even though we have modern antiviral and antibacterial drugs, vaccines, and prevention knowledge, the return of a pandemic virus like the 1917 one, would likely kill >100 million people worldwide.
If this is repeated…does it mean Global Warming folks can cheer the lower CO2 emissions…or would that seem insensitive?