Swine Flu: Twitter to the rescue

ScottM

ScottM

Taxi to Parking
Joined
Jul 19, 2005
Messages
42,530
Location
Variable, but somewhere on earth
Display Name
Display name:
iBazinga!
Here are some helpful hints about the swine flu

swine_flu.png
 
kevin47881 said:
Swine flu....just another silly scare the public like the bird flu a couple year ago. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...


Man, I hope you are right! But... I pilot I know, Bonanza owner, a senior prof at a major vet school and considered a world expert in the swine flu virus. He told an airline pal of mine to call in sick if he gets assigned any flights to Mexico or southern CA.

Just a curious data point.

MM
 
I remember the last 'swine flu' epidemic. Much ado about nothing.

Right now in the US there are 50 cases. Out of about 303,500,000 people. That is .00000165 percent of the population. AND if you do get the swine flu the treatment is the same as the regular flu. me thinks some CDC people are bored and making a bigger deal out of this for increased funding. The press are willing dupes in this as panic always causes a ratings increase.
 
smigaldi said:
I remember the last 'swine flu' epidemic. Much ado about nothing.

Right now in the US there are 50 cases. Out of about 303,500,000 people. That is .00000165 percent of the population. AND if you do get the swine flu the treatment is the same as the regular flu. me thinks some CDC people are bored and making a bigger deal out of this for increased funding. The press are willing dupes in this as panic always causes a ratings increase.
Click to expand...

No, the press is pushing the agenda because it's sensational and low cost/high profit programming. Gotta have material to keep you scared and glued to the TV. The CDC has to do something to look good and "on top of it". If they did now what they did when I was a kid and advise "Rest and stay hydrated", the same 24hr news programmers would have to make up the slack time with articles lambasting them for their "casual approach for this dreaded disease which will surely have the potential of killing hundreds of old people around the world".
 
I do not know what is worse...the fear of swine flu or the use of the lame service known as twitter.
 
smigaldi said:
I remember the last 'swine flu' epidemic. Much ado about nothing.

Right now in the US there are 50 cases. Out of about 303,500,000 people. That is .00000165 percent of the population. AND if you do get the swine flu the treatment is the same as the regular flu. me thinks some CDC people are bored and making a bigger deal out of this for increased funding. The press are willing dupes in this as panic always causes a ratings increase.
Click to expand...

Yes, but it could reach epidemic proportions:eek::yikes::eek: The CDC is bringing several million doses of the vaccine out, that should cover it for the people who are at high risk for dying, and should probably be allowed to die anyway. The planet needs a major purging of people. Influenza has historically been one of natures tools. We've been denying nature her due for a long time now with modern technology. One night she's gonna be doing tequila shots and say "f- them little bastards, think their better than me...." and the dying will commence.....
 
smigaldi said:
I remember the last 'swine flu' epidemic. Much ado about nothing.

Right now in the US there are 50 cases. Out of about 303,500,000 people. That is .00000165 percent of the population. AND if you do get the swine flu the treatment is the same as the regular flu. me thinks some CDC people are bored and making a bigger deal out of this for increased funding. The press are willing dupes in this as panic always causes a ratings increase.
Click to expand...

So now the US CDC is so powerful they can make the mayor of Mexico City shut the city down? :nono:
 
Henning said:
Yes, but it could reach epidemic proportions:eek::yikes::eek: The CDC is bringing several million doses of the vaccine out, that should cover it for the people who are at high risk for dying, and should probably be allowed to die anyway. The planet needs a major purging of people. Influenza has historically been one of natures tools. We've been denying nature her due for a long time now with modern technology. One night she's gonna be doing tequila shots and say "f- them little bastards, think their better than me...." and the dying will commence.....
Click to expand...

I discussed this ad nauseum with a close friend the other night. Long and short of this is, this is affecting perfectly healthy, strong-immune-system mid-lifers. Basically, our immune response is so severe that it overwhelms our lungs with mucous, and (if we're lucky), we get put on a respirator and we hope for the best.

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
Well I guess I better stay away and out of Dr's offices, hospitals and airports! Ohhhhh wait......:rolleyes:
 
I read the CDC's page on the swine flu... there "is no shot" for it.

Then what were they giving people in 1976?


...."doo-doo-dooo-dooo" music....

CDC Key Facts page said:
Swine Flu Key Facts
Is there a vaccine for swine flu?
Vaccines are available to be given to pigs to prevent swine influenza. There is no vaccine to protect humans from swine flu. The seasonal influenza vaccine will likely help provide partial protection against swine H3N2, but not swine H1N1 viruses.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
There are vaccines for swine, avian, and human flu's IIRC.

The bugger is when the genetics change quickly (a "shift"), versus the yearly, slow changes (a "drift"). The flu vaccine many of us receive is updated yearly to inoculate us against the drift that researchers model is likely and occurring in the wild. This variant has not been seen before (e.g. this is a "shift"), and we don't have the code cracked of how to defeat it.

Cheers,

-Andrew
got a crash course in virology and immunology this weekend
 
smigaldi said:
I remember the last 'swine flu' epidemic. Much ado about nothing.

Right now in the US there are 50 cases. Out of about 303,500,000 people. That is .00000165 percent of the population. AND if you do get the swine flu the treatment is the same as the regular flu. me thinks some CDC people are bored and making a bigger deal out of this for increased funding. The press are willing dupes in this as panic always causes a ratings increase.
Click to expand...
Well, yeah, but an epidemic always starts with 50 cases out of millions of people :confused:
 
Henning said:
Yes, but it could reach epidemic proportions:eek::yikes::eek: The CDC is bringing several million doses of the vaccine out, that should cover it for the people who are at high risk for dying, and should probably be allowed to die anyway. The planet needs a major purging of people. Influenza has historically been one of natures tools. We've been denying nature her due for a long time now with modern technology. One night she's gonna be doing tequila shots and say "f- them little bastards, think their better than me...." and the dying will commence.....
Click to expand...

LOL...too funny, and very close to my own thoughts.

Of course I am a selfish bastige too and so long as none of MY family dies (well maybe one or two :eek:) then I am fine with a good purge! :D
 
Reminds me of the Book and Movie called The Stand before it gets in to the religious crap.
 
Another Twitter-worthy post:

"I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out then under another Democrat president Jimmy Carter. And I'm not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it's an interesting coincidence."
-- Rep. Michelle Bachmann. In fact, Gerald Ford was president during the last outbreak of the virus.
 
astanley said:
I discussed this ad nauseum with a close friend the other night. Long and short of this is, this is affecting perfectly healthy, strong-immune-system mid-lifers. Basically, our immune response is so severe that it overwhelms our lungs with mucous, and (if we're lucky), we get put on a respirator and we hope for the best.

Cheers,

-Andrew
Click to expand...

IIRC, the US military lost more soldiers to Influenza than to enemy action during WW-1.
 
Over 60,000 people in the US die form the flu each year.

Death rate extrapolations for USA for Flu: 63,729 per year, 5,310 per month, 1,225 per week, 174 per day, 7 per hour, 0 per minute, 0 per second. Note: this automatic extrapolation calculation uses the deaths statistic: 63,730 annual deaths for influenza and pneumonia (NVSR Sep 2001); estimated 20,000 deaths from flu (NIAID)
Click to expand...

Why is the swine flu causing such a panic over such a few cases?
 
smigaldi said:
Over 60,000 people in the US die form the flu each year. Why is the swine flu causing such a panic over such a few cases?
Click to expand...

Hopefully one of our medical professionals will jump in; I was wondering the same thing. I heard a doctor on the news today say that the reason is that nobody has immunity to this new strain, and there is no currently available vaccine for it (there might be, but not before September).

So, if I understand that correctly, with no immunity, this new strain could theoretically spread like wildfire through even normally healthy foks with hardy immune systems, not to mention the usual elderly and young that they worry about with the "normal flu"... and there could be many many more than 60,000 that die.
 
smigaldi said:
Over 60,000 people in the US die form the flu each year.
Why is the swine flu causing such a panic over such a few cases?
Click to expand...

I assume because of the potential for:

The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 killed more people than the Great War, known today as World War I (WWI), at somewhere between 20 and 40 million people. It has been cited as the most devastating epidemic in recorded world history.
...
In the two years that this scourge ravaged the earth, a fifth of the world's population was infected. The flu was most deadly for people ages 20 to 40. This pattern of morbidity was unusual for influenza which is usually a killer of the elderly and young children. It infected 28% of all Americans (Tice).
...
The effect of the influenza epidemic was so severe that the average life span in the US was depressed by 10 years. The influenza virus had a profound virulence, with a mortality rate at 2.5% compared to the previous influenza epidemics, which were less than 0.1%. The death rate for 15 to 34-year-olds of influenza and pneumonia were 20 times higher in 1918 than in previous years
Click to expand...

http://virus.stanford.edu/uda/
 
Not a medical professional, didn't stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night, but here's what I've learned.

  • This influenza is "new" to our systems. When that happens, we can't rely on our existing defenses to help us out.
  • Unlike the base rate of influenza death (600k/year worldwide if I remember correctly), this particular strain has the ability to register deaths many, many times that
  • Unlike the typical influenza death profile, this is more likely to effect young adults and adults more severely than the elderly, infirm, or very young children.
  • Because this virus is in the wild before we've sequenced it and understand how it drifts over time (mutates from victim to victim), it makes early treatment all the more paramount. This means that if you don't catch it early, you are at a statistically higher risk of a severe infection than the typical influenza strains
  • Early treatment is hampered because of available antiviral stocks. The US has ~25% of the population covered in strategic reserves. Ramp up time to fill the other 75% is potentially beyond the time horizon for a pandemic unfolding.
  • Things spread faster than they did in previous times. Air travel, air cargo, wide-spread food supply chains and other issues make it easier for this virus to spread width-wise (locally), and long (globally) over a very short timeline
  • In the case of any potential pandemic, it is far better to get the news out on the street faster and get people preparing faster than not. Just reinforcing the "wash your hands regularly" can pay off in spades.

I've learned this through a close friend (med student) and my sister (works at a large infectious diseases lab in MA) over the past few days. Amazing, amazing stuff.

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
Last edited:
smigaldi said:
Over 60,000 people in the US die form the flu each year.



Why is the swine flu causing such a panic over such a few cases?
Click to expand...
Because about 60% of those who got it in Mexico died from it.
 
AuntPeggy said:
Because about 60% of those who got it in Mexico died from it.
Click to expand...
I only have a minor in math but
The Mexican government is suspending non-essential activities for five days, starting Friday. Mexican Health Minister Jose Cordova said food, medical and transportation sectors will not be affected. He also said there are 99 confirmed cases of swine flu in Mexico, eight of them fatalities.
Click to expand...
http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-04-30-voa5.cfm


That is not 60% to me. more like 8.1%

Here in the US since January of 2009 there have been 13,000 deaths related to seasonal flu.

but since January more than 13,000 people have died of complications from seasonal flu, officials said.
Click to expand...
http://www.upi.com/Health_News/2009/04/28/US-seasonal-flu-kills-13000-since-Jan/UPI-64801240974841/

Where did you get the 60% Mexican fatality rate? It sounds like a panic number.
 
AuntPeggy said:
Probably. One of those 24-hour all the news we can scream at ya shows.
Click to expand...
:D:D Probably!


I did find a couple of articles that stated there were 60 deaths suspected from swine flu. But even if you do the right stat and divide that into suspected swine flu cases, 1000 BTW, that is only about 6%.
 
smigaldi said:
Over 60,000 people in the US die form the flu each year.



Why is the swine flu causing such a panic over such a few cases?
Click to expand...

Because it raises the value of commercial placements between scare mongering catch phrases....
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Hopefully one of our medical professionals will jump in; I was wondering the same thing. I heard a doctor on the news today say that the reason is that nobody has immunity to this new strain, and there is no currently available vaccine for it (there might be, but not before September).

So, if I understand that correctly, with no immunity, this new strain could theoretically spread like wildfire through even normally healthy foks with hardy immune systems, not to mention the usual elderly and young that they worry about with the "normal flu"... and there could be many many more than 60,000 that die.
Click to expand...

So? This makes fear mongering and inciting panic reasonable why? What's going to happen is going to happen.Will some people die? Of course. Will more than usually die? Maybe. Will this be a worldwide pandemic that sheds the Earth of 80% of it's human burden? We can only hope, but I'm sceptical of good things happening. Regardless, there's no change to the outcome we can manipulate in the face of nature, and certainly nothing that drumming up hysteria will help.
 
You know Henning, I'm a complete and total believer in population reduction as a pretty good cure to what ails the world. However, 80% might not leave enough people to manage and contain all the hazardous and potentially devastating artifacts of human industrialization. Besides, if 80% croaked there would be a breeding frenzy which as fun as it would be, would only take humanity right back where we are now. How about say, 30% reduction with zero population growth following. K?
 
wby0nder said:
You know Henning, I'm a complete and total believer in population reduction as a pretty good cure to what ails the world. However, 80% might not leave enough people to manage and contain all the hazardous and potentially devastating artifacts of human industrialization. Besides, if 80% croaked there would be a breeding frenzy which as fun as it would be, would only take humanity right back where we are now. How about say, 30% reduction with zero population growth following. K?
Click to expand...

I'm hoping nature will "select" the stupid, and that's about 80%....
 
Just got an email that Egypt will be shutting down the airports if the WHO goes to a level 6 alert for H1N1, they are currently at level 5.

Shear idiocy and panic!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top