Thursday, August 6, 2009

Fact vs. Fiction

H1N1: Separating Swine Flu Fact from Fiction.

I thought I would share the above article as it has some good information. Before last week, I was quite sure that the Swine Flu would never affect my family. Unfortunately, it is pretty contagious and most of the US will be affected at some point this winter. If I were you, I would stock up on Tylenol, Motrin and other over the counter meds to help with the symptoms. I would also buy a box of surgical masks (you can get these at Walgreens/CVS) and lots of hand sanitizer. Use Clorox Wipes or Lysol on all door knobs, tv remotes and telephones. I also bought a couple of boxes of the anti-bacterial Kleenex.

The most worrisome part of this whole thing is that this virus could quite possibly mutate in the next few months and go from being a mild virus to something much more serious. H1N1 is very active right now (mid summer) when the flu season is usually very light.

While our bodies have some immunity to the flu (just simply because we've been exposed to many strains), we have virtually no immunity to the H1N1 Novel virus. This means we need to be extra careful!

On a lighter note....I want to know why they call it the Swine Flu?? I mean, we have the Asian Flu and the Spanish Flu. Why don't we use country of origin on this one and call it what it really is....the Mexican Flu? After all, you can't get this flu from eating pork products!

4 comments:

Unknown said...

I believe it is called swine flu because the original strain did indeed come from a pig to a farmer. No, you can't get it from eating pork, but the strain did originate with the swine.

Thanks for the info!

Mary N. said...

I pray my daughter doesn't get this. There were some cases at her school in June. Thanks for the information. I will keep praying for your family.

Laura said...

Thanks for the heads up.
I thought this had gone away.
Yikes.

Frizzy said...

My biggest question is what are the symptoms? How did you or your Dr know it was Swine flu?