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WHO Declares Swine Flu Pandemic

Kawamura

Kawamura

Supernova
Joined
Jan 9, 2009
Article here.

I find this very interesting. As was pointed out, this is our first flu pandemic to identify so early and watch so closely. If the virus remains moderate, I'm extremely excited to watch it.

Anyone else like flu?
 
I don't understand the interest. It has a mortality rate of about a half a percent (<link>). Its less likely to kill someone than diarrhea caused by amoebic dysentery, cryptosporidiosis, or gastroenteritis, which affect over a billion people a year due to a lack of clean water... the UN's estimated cost to provide clean water to everyone in the world who doesn't have it is $20-$30 billion per year yet $11.5 billion in bottled water was sold in the U.S. alone last year.

So why is it that H1N1 is interesting to you? As someone who is interested by it, could you guess why it seems to be so much more in the news than the fact that 2 million children die from diarrhea every year (or 114 during every episode of The Office)? My theory? Because rich white people import their water from Fiji, where the average person lives on 80 dollars a week. :lol:
 
I find both influenza and pandemics to be interesting. Flu strains also have the ability to mutate quickly, producing strains that are both pandemic and deadly (especially the ugly ones that cause hypercytokinemia). Watching a flu pandemic evolve as it's happening is something I've yet to see.
 
I can't say that I am interested in it, per se. I'm someone who gets their kicks from seeing people freak out about it, though. I just saw a news report for my local news and all it really mentioned was, "PANDEMIC FLU PANDEMIC!!11!"
 
I don't know. I don't think I enjoy watching people panic like that; it sorta makes me feel that they're not understanding what the announcement really means.

On the plus side, if it makes people wash their hands more often and cover their faces with the crook of their arm when they sneeze, I'm for it.
 
Eh, in the end, it's up to the news and announcements to make things clearer to the people. Like I said, the news report I had saw in my local news only mentioned the title of it being a pandemic. When people hear that and no extra details, of course there is going to be some panic, however, if they are smart then that panic will make them look at the actual details. ...At least, I think that's how it's supposed to go.

So, I guess I really only laugh at the truly ignorant ones. I think that if you don't look into a situation fully before panicking, then you deserve to freak out; for the ones who have the ability to look, anyhow. Of course, there will always be areas with bad inquires on the specific details.

My sister has two children who are two years old and one; I would consider any parent with a child to be a little panicky. Children are more likely to die from the H1N1 virus, like anything else virus and bacteria wise (for the most part).
 
Children and elderly are always more likely to die from H1N1, which is also the seasonal flu.

This strain of H1N1 has an interesting history and may produce the W-like fatality curve that the 1918 epidemic had. Or it may simply infect a lot of people but have a low mortality rate.
 
It seems to be just a very contagious flu that,.. is not exactly effective.. if anything it is just simply annoying and most death cases.. (generalization coming up) are from people who already are sick with something else.. or just have poor health,.

It partially reminds me of the whole bird flu crysis again.. sure some places got hit a lot harder then others.. but even when one compares Bird Flu to Swine Flu.. it might be a similar strand but effect wise, Bird Flu was more close to an pandemic then Swine Flu will ever be.. Unless some major changes occur and people start randomly mutating.. heh, real life demons anyone?
 
Kratos said:
It seems to be just a very contagious flu that,.. is not exactly effective.. if anything it is just simply annoying and most death cases.. (generalization coming up) are from people who already are sick with something else.. or just have poor health,.

It partially reminds me of the whole bird flu crysis again.. sure some places got hit a lot harder then others.. but even when one compares Bird Flu to Swine Flu.. it might be a similar strand but effect wise, Bird Flu was more close to an pandemic then Swine Flu will ever be.. Unless some major changes occur and people start randomly mutating.. heh, real life demons anyone?
Click to expand...

Bird flu never made the jump to human-to-human infections, if I remember correctly, and so never reached the wide range of a pandemic. I have heard the strain is rather unstable, though, which is the big concern. And most people the died in Mexico were young and healthy, I think.
 
Really.. I thought bird flu jumped from person to person.. my mistake.. if that was not the case, but over a short time it did seem a lot more vicious then what has been shown by the swine flu. Guess we can't call either a pandemic.. and just look at cancer being the closest thing.. the reason..

Were all born with some sort of cancer, it just depends if it activates or not.. and when, its a flaw of.. our not so perfect, perfection. (note I have no evidence to back this up.. just throwing it out there as an example)
 
Kratos said:
Really.. I thought bird flu jumped from person to person.. my mistake.. if that was not the case, but over a short time it did seem a lot more vicious then what has been shown by the swine flu. Guess we can't call either a pandemic.. and just look at cancer being the closest thing.. the reason..

Were all born with some sort of cancer, it just depends if it activates or not.. and when, its a flaw of.. our not so perfect, perfection. (note I have no evidence to back this up.. just throwing it out there as an example)
Click to expand...

No, there might have been two, three cases of human-to-human transmission. The rest have been bird-to-human.

The swine flu is currently pandemic. H5N1 is very deadly, but not pandemic. Because influenza is a RNA virus (I think that's the name), it's very unstable. It can easily evolve or pick up the traits of other strains through reassortment. I mean, that's why this strain of H1N1 is weird: it's a mix of the H1N1 in birds, people, and pigs.
 
Ilovegoatse said:
We'll forget the fact that Mexico probably doesn't have the best health care, yes?
Click to expand...

It helps, but flu is a tricky beast. The virus is wide spread enough that WHO considers it a pandemic and even with poor health care, elderly and the very young tend to die, not the healthy adults.
 
If we called everything that was a little contagious a pandemic... then we would have quite a few pandemics on our hands.. although STD's don't count do they ? hah

Flu's are evil.. but still I would have expected more people to be infected for a pandemic.. I will admit though it is quite an odd strand to say the least although it makes we wonder what flu we will have next.. first standard.. then bird. then pig,.. whats next dog?
 
HIV is pandemic as well. Not everything contagious is a pandemic; diseases that infect a stable number of folks and are endemic to the region are not considered pandemic.

I'm not entirely sure what the exact criteria WHO uses to define pandemics. I know the fact the disease crops up in waves is one common feature. I also think the fact that it's a new strain is another.
 
Possibly how fast it seems to evolve, spread.. how new like you said.. and that it is contagious is probably all that determines a pandemic other then like you said the definite waves thing..
 
From WHO's website regarding H5N1:

"A pandemic can start when three conditions have been met: a new influenza virus subtype emerges; it infects humans, causing serious illness; and it spreads easily and sustainably among humans. The H5N1 virus amply meets the first two conditions: it is a new virus for humans (H5N1 viruses have never circulated widely among people), and it has infected more than 100 humans, killing over half of them. No one will have immunity should an H5N1-like pandemic virus emerge."

So that's the definition: a new, non endemic disease that spreads easily. The only part that seems iffy is the lethality. The current pandemic is not particularly lethal at the moment.

I'll have to explore this more.
 
I have heard recent reports on the news.. (well you can't trust Australian news anyhow.. but still..) that apparently it has become worse, as in the symptoms are more harsh and the rate of death has risen.. .. That and although I have no sources to back this up yet.. I have heard from a few people I know, that it apparently causes damage to the lungs of the people (which could be a huge problem.. as Lungs are important heh) who get it regardless how mild the flu seems.

Still it is nothing even close to the half way percentage mark.. Out of how much swine flu has spread.. I would say,.. roughly not even half a percent of the recievers have died,.. although I have no clue now.. how many are infected.. and the news have stopped speaking about it so it would seem other then that little bit I heard of it becoming worse..
 
Again, a large quote stolen directly from the WHO website.

"What about severity?

At this time, WHO considers the overall severity of the influenza pandemic to be moderate. This assessment is based on scientific evidence available to WHO, as well as input from its Member States on the pandemic's impact on their health systems, and their social and economic functioning.

The moderate assessment reflects that:

* Most people recover from infection without the need for hospitalization or medical care.
* Overall, national levels of severe illness from influenza A(H1N1) appear similar to levels seen during local seasonal influenza periods, although high levels of disease have occurred in some local areas and institutions.
* Overall, hospitals and health care systems in most countries have been able to cope with the numbers of people seeking care, although some facilities and systems have been stressed in some localities."

Here's the part that's a bit alarming:

"WHO is concerned about current patterns of serious cases and deaths that are occurring primarily among young persons, including the previously healthy and those with pre-existing medical conditions or pregnancy.

Large outbreaks of disease have not yet been reported in many countries, and the full clinical spectrum of disease is not yet known. "

It's an unknown. And, if I remember correctly, 1918's pandemic started with a wave of moderate illness followed by a much more deadly strain later on. Also, sporadic cases of a strain that is resistant to one of the antivirals have shown up. Just a few, so it's a fluke, but it's a fear that one of these resistant strains can infect a body with another strain in it and it'll end up tossing up genes.

The problem with the Southern Hemisphere is that it is now going through it's seasonal flu season.
 
The 1918 pandemic.. would that be considered the black plaque? (I can't believe I have forgotten when that occurred..)... from which I recall,,.. that was just nasty but was it a pandemic.. since some people had immunity surprisingly.. although others just avoided pure contact... the burning of bodies the only way to try and keep the casualties from rising astronomically higher then what they already were..
 
Ah, no. Black Death (out break of the Plague) occurred in the late fourteenth century and there have been several large outbreaks of it since.

1918 was flu. Spanish flu, it was called, and is the ancestor to the normal seasonal flu, to a strain endemic in pigs and one in birds as well. That's Influenza subtype A H1N1. If I remember.

No one had immunity to that, I don't think, as it was a new strain not seen in people before.
 
That and medical compared to now.. was very.. very basic.. so it's quite a surprise they actually eventually managed to work out a cure.. or did it simply just go away?
 
One doesn't really cure viruses. Eventually, the strain infects everyone it cans, and people either die or survive with an immunity and the virus becomes the fairly friendly seasonal flu (which kills a good number of folks, but not the young and healthy like the 1918 flu).

While there have been improvements in the last century, medical care at the turn of the century wasn't as horrible as just fifty years before that. By that time, people did do things like wash their hands in between patients (modern doctors forget to do this quite often) and sterilize equipment, if I remember correctly.
 
Either way flu's as a disease just suck.. one can't truly just get rid of them because instead it just mutates to create new strands.. I just hope one day we don't get hit with a flu.. that is a combination of everything we have seen so far of the various strands.. That would just be cruel..

Hmm fair call, one could say our modern doctors might no more.. but they do forget simple little things like that.. especially the hygienic, washing hands between patients.. I guess because what a pandemic is.. I will finally say Swine flu is one.. but not purely unless it gets more severe.
 
Speaking of pandemics, anyone ever read The Hot Zone or Demon In The Freezer?
Those books made me get all excited when WHO declared AH1N1 a pandemic.
But then I remembered it would be a 'slow burn' pandemic.
So I went and played Pandemic and killed off the human population in just under a year. :D

There hasn't been any military quarantines or mass panics, anything like that around England. Just a couple deaths.
I haven't heard of anyone nearby caught it. Not very exciting. Just more proof the media sprints full-tilt with whatever they can get their grubby hands on.

Does anyone know which CDC Biohazard Level AH1N1 is? Influenza A is Level 2, and since AH1N1 has killed a few dozen people 'round the world, I think it would be upped to Level 3 for 'causing severe to fatal disease in humans'. Cytosine Storm, Pneumonia.. Sounds fitting.
 
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