Friday, October 9, 2009

Swine Flu





Swine Flu


The Plague of the 21st Century

If you get the flu you may get a fever, sore throat, chills and maybe start to vomit. If you get the swine flu you may get some of these symptoms as well just the repercussions may be much worse. According to BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) there has been over 125,000 reported cases of swine flu since its outbreak four months ago and over 700 deaths worldwide.
This disease may turn into a real problem once cooler months start to come because this new flu has spread in about six weeks as wide as influenza had spread in six months. Even with a new vaccine available on the market for use, this disease will have a monstrous effect on the country this flu season because the vaccine may not be available to all.
The BBC has also said that they believe that at least thirty percent of the UK’s population will become infected with the H1N1 this season. the believed outcome is 82.7-82.9 % percent of the people who get it only having mild symptoms but also have a fatality rate of anywhere from 0.1-3.5% with other statistics mixed in.
The groups that are at the highest risk of infection are children bellow the age of five, pregnant women, and the elderly. Hopefully the numbers by the BBC don’t add up because if so then that means around 18,000 infected Brits with 800 to 1000 of them ending up dying from the disease.
On the American side, the country has lost 263 to t is disease (the greatest if any country so far) and has declared a public health emergency. Over two billion dollars of emergency funds will go for purchasing vaccine materials to insure that the impact of the disease this season may not be as bad as it is supposed to be.
The world may not like to face the truth but we are stuck with a major disease on our hands. This will definitely not be as bad as the Black Plague over in Europe, but if we don’t prepare well now, the death toll this season may be greater than we wish it to be. All we can do is get our annual flu shots and if the offer it, the H1N1 shot and also do our best to keep healthy this season. We are basically walking into a wall of water and it is our decision of how much of us are going to get washed away.

3 comments:

  1. I think that swine flu is a myth and it is just the same as the regular flu with a pig name

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am glad I am not at high risk because you said children under the age of five elderly people and pregnat people are at high risk

    ReplyDelete