I have been reading and watching a lot about influenza for a couple of years, ever since I had a bout of flu six years ago. And I am not referring to man flu, or a bad cold. I was off work for a couple of weeks and took a month or more to recover.
But it did fascinate me that flu is consider a serious illness, with the annual vaccinations and all the adverts that promote them. The last major pandemic was the 1918 spanish flu that struck across Europe and kill millions. One of the stats is that there was a major flu outbreak every so many years but the last one was the Spanish flu outbreak. Since then there has been nothing and this got scientists worried. All the attention has been on the bird flu variant that despite the fatalities has not made the jump to human to human infection.
Suddenly there is a outbreak of swine flu that looks like it made have made the jump. Could we be seeing the first major flu pandemic in nearly a hundred years? What will be the effect on the world? Will it have a major impact on the population of the world? What would happen if it hit China or India hard? Between them China and India account for nearly 50% of the population of the planet, and both are major manufacturing and support centres for the west?
Will air travel be locked down or will it be allowed to continue and (as seen in countless movies) be the catalyst to creating this pandemic?
Is anyone concerned about the potential or will modern medicine find a cure?
The reason for all the fuss about bird flu is because the 1918 outbreak which killed about 40 million people is now known to have been a bird flu. I remember Honk Kong Flu which was a pandemic in the 60’s that killed about a million people. That was a swine flu. With Honk Kong Flu death rates in developed nations were relativly low and I imagine the same will be true this time.
“The WHO is advising countries to be vigilant for seasonally unusual flu or pneumonia-like symptoms among their populations - particularly among young healthy adults, a characteristic of past pandemics.”
Typical media trying to scare us! Look at the big hoo har they made about the last “pandemic” in China in 2003…how many died? 247! I’ll worry when its millions like the last SERIOUS outbreak of deadly flu. Winds me up coz now our hospitals will be inundated with people suffering with supposive symptoms, runny nose etc, that havent even been abroad or near an airport
well, if everyone in the third world and asia ate like we have the privilege, there would not be enough food in the world to feed everyone.
This is natures way of balancing the books.
Also, a medical expert was just on the news there stating that thousands of people die from flu every year anyway, so i think you can stop worrying kev :w00t::w00t::w00t:
As mentioned above - these species hopping flus don’t kill the weak, they kill the people with the strongest immune systems as it is the immune system that does the damage by destroying the deseased lung tissue. The reports from Mexico suggest it is young adults who have been dying, just as this chart comparing Spanish Flu deaths with flu deaths in other years.
