this new virus is already affected 11 states, and it will consume the rest in a very short time. all the precautions that you can do to keep from passing it, isn't going to be enough if you are already a carrier without knowing it. if you have any loved ones that are old, or any illness that effects their immune system, try to keep them away from everyone, including yourself, as much as possible. from talking with many people and travelling around the country, i feel that i need to warn everyone that this virus is ever-changing. So by the time they create an anecdote for the first strand of the virus, there is a great chance that it will prove ineffective on the virus that would now be affecting people at that time...let's hope that they work very hard on following this. i look for all school systems to be closed within three weeks, and within the next two weeks, you'll be reading about the fatalities in many states. i don't know how far this will go. but the fear and the panic in the american people is going to be excessively great because of the fatalities.

if i am wrong, praise the lord!........but if i'm right, everyone needs a plan B, for their fragile others. i hope and pray that everybody here doesn't become infected.
if you're young, and in good health, you have nothing to fear from this strand now. if you're weak, stay away from everyone.




Peace, Love, be Real!

We are waiting on test results here in Alabama. I know that one county has canceled school until Monday and all extra curricular activities have been canceled state wide. And I work in a doctor's office with sick patients all day so I'm hoping and praying this blows over. People that are sick just need to stay home and if they suspect they have this flu you need to call your doctor and see if they can call in tamiflu rather than getting out and exposing everyone!

This is from my local news paper. Port Perry is like 30 minutes away from me. (sorry for the length, but this thing is scaring me sh!tless ).

Three young Port Perry women who are Ontario's first confirmed cases of swine flu returned from Cancun on Friday with symptoms but spent the weekend at the local casino and visiting friends because their local hospital never advised them to stay home.

And even after 21-year-old Justine Stevenson was informed on Tuesday afternoon that she has the virus, no one has told her mom to close her home daycare business.

So incredibly, Barb Stevenson is still taking care of three children while her daughter with swine flu remains upstairs in her room.

"The daycare kids have already been exposed," Justine's mother said yesterday. "They're not around her, but I've been around her. But they told her that as long as you stay in your room, they should be OK."

It doesn't make much sense to her, but then nothing does in the way this probable pandemic has been handled by local health officials. If there was any hope of containing this swine flu before it got out into the community, it was apparently lost this weekend.

CELEBRATION

Justine Stevenson flew to Cancun April 17 with two girlfriends to celebrate the completion of her three-year graphic arts degree at Durham College. A few days after arriving at the all-inclusive resort, she began texting her mom that they were all getting sick -- the first friend on Monday, the second on Tuesday and then Justine herself on Wednesday.

"It wasn't that bad," Justine said. "It was one day of having a fever and being short of breath. The regular flu is worse."

With news of swine flu coming out of Mexico, her mother was anxious to get her home. "We just wanted to get these kids back to Toronto," Stevenson said. "If they quarantine them in Toronto, fine, I fully expected that."

To her surprise, that didn't happen. The sick friends arrived at Pearson airport Friday night and were taken straight to Lakeridge Health's Port Perry hospital by one of the mothers, who is a nurse there. Stevenson said the emergency room doctor called Durham public health as required, took chest X-rays, tested for influenza and sent the girls on their way.

"The hospital said we were fine, that we were good to go. We had all the symptoms so it was sketchy that they said we were fine," Justine recalled.

"Is this a big deal or not?" added her mother. "Why did they not quarantine the girls right away?"

A Lakeridge hospital official said he couldn't comment specifically on the case but that all proper protocols had been followed.

Not knowing they were still contagious, since swine flu can be spread up to seven days after the onset of illness, the three girlfriends went to the casino in Port Perry on Saturday night to visit one of their fathers working there and also had several get-togethers with friends. No one had told them to stay home until their tests came back.

"They've been out all weekend," Justine's mother said with alarm. "They were all around the town. Who else have they exposed to this?"

Theresa Kennedy lives across the street and is worried because her son spent Sunday over at the Stevenson house playing with Justine's 12-year-old brother.

"I believe Toronto might be ready, but we aren't," the angry mother said. "Why weren't these girls isolated while they were waiting for their results? I want answers. This was handled so wrong, so wrong.

"We're on the borderline of a pandemic here. This isn't something the health department should screw around with. It's too late now and it's sad."

On Monday the three women learned they had tested positive for influenza A. It was only then that Durham public health told them to stay home, put a mask on around family members and start taking the anti-viral Relenza, just in case it did turn out to be swine flu.

But their local pharmacies only had enough doses for Justine; the other two had to wait until the next day before they could start their medication.

Yet, Ontario health officials insist we are ready for a pandemic?

Late Tuesday afternoon, Justine and her friends got calls from the Durham health department confirming they did indeed have the first swine flu cases in Ontario.

"Don't frigging tell me that," her mother recalled thinking. "I was angry. From Friday night to Tuesday afternoon, who knows who we've exposed?"

Stevenson said she's told health officials about her home daycare business, but they didn't seem concerned as long as her daughter stays away from the children. One mother has cancelled on her, but she is still caring for three children.

NO DIRECT CONTACT

"Justine doesn't really come into contact with the kids. I'm more concerned that I was with her over the weekend and now I'm with the kids."

Should she be isolating herself? Should she be keeping her son home from school and her husband from work? No one has told her anything.

"If I have one of the few cases of swine flu in the GTA in my house, am I not somebody who should be called and told what to do?" Stevenson asked in frustration. "I'm concerned that we've passed it on to somebody else and it didn't need to happen."

We have a case in South Bend T

I heard that Enzyte will prevent and cure it so I been taking a lot of that.

A. The virus isn't any deadlier than any other flu virus.
B. 40k people die of the flu in this country alone every year.
C. So far, only the very young have died from it.
D. Only in Mexico have any deaths been recorded from this flu.
E. If you do happen to get it, do all the things you'd normally do if you have the flu. i.e. get plenty of rest, drink lots of liquids, stay home. duh.

Chicken Little, the sky is not falling.

Sorry this is lengthy but it is helpful!!

WASHINGTON - A never-before-seen strain of swine flu has turned killer in Mexico and is causing milder illness in the United States and elsewhere. While authorities say it's not time to panic, they are taking steps to stem the spread and also urging people to pay close attention to the latest health warnings and take their own precautions.

Here's what you need to know:

Q: How do I protect myself and my family?

A: For now, take commonsense precautions. Cover your coughs and sneezes, with a tissue that you throw away or by sneezing into your elbow rather than your hand. Wash hands frequently; if soap and water aren't available, hand gels can substitute. Stay home if you're sick and keep children home from school if they are.

Q: How easy is it to catch this virus?

A: Scientists don't yet know if it takes fairly close or prolonged contact with someone who's sick, or if it's more easily spread. But in general, flu viruses spread through uncovered coughs and sneezes or — and this is important — by touching your mouth or nose with unwashed hands. Flu viruses can live on surfaces for several hours, like a doorknob just touched by someone who sneezed into his hand.

Q: In Mexico, officials are handing out face masks. Do I need one?

A: The CDC says there's not good evidence that masks really help outside of health care settings. It's safer just to avoid close contact with someone who's sick and avoid crowded gatherings in places where swine flu is known to be spreading. But if you can't do that, CDC guidelines say it's OK to consider a mask — just don't let it substitute for good precautions.

Q: Is swine flu treatable?

A: Yes, with the flu drugs Tamiflu or Relenza, but not with two older flu medications.

Q: Is there enough?

A: Yes. The federal government has stockpiled enough of the drugs to treat 50 million people, and many states have additional stocks. As a precaution, the CDC has shipped a quarter of that supply to the states to keep on hand just in case the virus starts spreading more than it has so far.

Q: Should I take Tamiflu as a precaution if I'm not sick yet?

A: No. "What are you going to do with it, use it when you get a sniffle?" asks Dr. Marc Siegel of New York University Langone Medical Center and author of "Bird Flu: Everything you Need To Know About The Next Pandemic." Overusing antiviral drugs can help germs become resistant to them.

Q: How big is my risk?

A: For most people, very low. Outside of Mexico, so far clusters of illnesses seem related to Mexican travel. New York City's cluster, for instance, consists of students and family members at one school where some students came back ill from spring break in Mexico.

Q: Why are people dying in Mexico and not here?

A: That's a mystery. First, understand that no one really knows just how many people in Mexico are dying of this flu strain, or how many have it. Only a fraction of the suspected deaths have been tested and confirmed as swine flu, and some initially suspected cases were caused by something else.

Q: Should I cancel my planned trip to Mexico?

A: The U.S. did issue a travel advisory Monday discouraging nonessential travel there.

Q: What else is the U.S., or anyone else, doing to try to stop this virus?

A: The U.S. is beginning limited screening of travelers from Mexico, so that the obviously sick can be sent for treatment. Other governments have issued their own travel warnings and restrictions. Mexico is taking the biggest steps, closings that limit most crowded gatherings. In the U.S., communities with clusters of illness also may limit contact — New York closed the affected school for a few days, for example — so stay tuned to hear if your area eventually is affected.

Q: What are the symptoms?

A: They're similar to regular human flu — a fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue. Some people also have diarrhea and vomiting.

Q: How do I know if I should see a doctor? Maybe my symptoms are from something else — like pollen?

A: Health authorities say if you live in places where swine flu cases have been confirmed, or you recently traveled to Mexico, and you have flulike symptoms, ask your doctor if you need treatment or to be tested. Allergies won't cause a fever. And run-of-the-mill stomach bugs won't be accompanied by respiratory symptoms, notes Dr. Wayne Reynolds of Newport News, Va., spokesman for the American Academy of Family Physicians.

Q: Is there a vaccine to prevent this new infection?

A: No. And CDC's initial testing suggests that last winter's flu shot didn't offer any cross-protection.

Q: How long would it take to produce a vaccine?

A: A few months. The CDC has created what's called "seed stock" of the new virus that manufacturers would need to start production. But the government hasn't yet decided if the outbreak is bad enough to order that.

Q: What is swine flu?

A: Pigs spread their own strains of influenza and every so often people catch one, usually after contact with the animals. This new strain is a mix of pig viruses with some human and bird viruses. Unlike more typical swine flu, it is spreading person-to-person. A 1976 outbreak of another unusual swine flu at Fort Dix, N.J., prompted a problematic mass vaccination campaign, but that time the flu fizzled out.

Q: So is it safe to eat pork?

A: Yes. Swine influenza viruses don't spread through food.

Q: And whatever happened to bird flu? Wasn't that supposed to be the next pandemic?

A: Specialists have long warned that the issue is a never-before-seen strain that people have little if any natural immunity to, regardless of whether it seems to originate from a bird or a pig. Bird flu hasn't gone away; scientists are tracking it, too.

people over here, in my own university no less, have confirmed cases of the cold!!

i thank you guys for reading this, and i can't stress how important i believe this could be, yet our own gov't i fear is not only afraid to tell us how this came into be, but also, that they might not fully even know yet. this is the first virus that i know of, in my lifetime that contains animal and human genetics. i'm not a scientist, but that's like your vetrinarian saying that your dog's heartworms can kill you, in other words i believe this was made in a laboratory. you all have the right to be fearful, but you also have the right to know what's going on!

MisKim...trust me....it won't be long before many counties in indiana will have people infected...

We have it here in Texas. That is where it started.

Don't blame me K,I had nothing to do w/ this outbreak.Geez!

Texas does. 22 month old baby. hopefully you're right, and i'm wrong.

sorry, I couldnt help it

I've been reading that the mortality rate so far has actually been slightly lower than the regular annual flu we get

You sure about that Steven?

I am gonna lock myself in a hermetically sealed room . Gonna test that , "NOt if you were the last man on earth ". Ha ! Who would be laughing then

It isn't any worse than the regular flu. That 23 month old would have died with the regular. It hits harder on the young and elderly.

It actually started in Mexico hun

I was talking about the U.S.

Very very true. At this very moment, world wide, more people have the regular flu. More people are dying of the regular flu. The only people who have died are in groups that are at the highest risk of death of the regular flu. In fact, outside of Mexico, this seems no worse than the regular flu. People seem to be in a panic for nothing.

Some kids from a college in New York contracted it during spring break in Mexico and brought it back to their college in New York