Tag: flu

How To Keep Yourself from Being Infected With Swine Flu

How To Keep Yourself from Being Infected With Swine Flu

Swine flu is an illness which derives its name from a virus that infects pigs. While the virus cannot affect people, they are likely to get an infection from time to time. The virus is communicable and can be transmitted from one person to another.

The symptoms of swine flu are like those manifested in a regular flu and may include cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, fever, chills and fatigue.

The H1N1 virus continues to become widespread in the United States. The Center for Disease Control believes that the number of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths will continue within the coming days and weeks.

The Center for Disease Control is aggressively responding to the growing outbreak. The objective of the agency is to curb the spread and severity of the illness as well as to inform health care providers, public health officials, and the general public to fend off the challenge by the medical crisis. Likewise, the CDC is giving interim guidance on a daily basis as a response to the rapidly growing crisis.

For treating swine flu, there are antiviral medicines that can be administered. So far, oseltamivir, amantadine, rimantadine, and zanamivir are the approved drugs for swine influenza treatment in the United States.
However, amantadine and rimantadine will not work against swine flu as the H1N1 virus was found to be resistant against these medicines. Laboratory procedures, on the other hand, have proven that H1N1 is susceptible to oseltavimir and zanavimir.

Using antiviral drugs in the treatment of swine influenza works by making your illness milder and making you feel relieved earlier than expected. Aside from that, antiviral medicines prevent the onset of serious complications.

Antiviral medicines are most effective when administered after the onset of the illness usually within a couple of days. However, it should be considered two days after the onset of symptoms, especially for hospitalized patients or those at greater risk for influenza-related complications.

Administration of anti viral drugs is also useful in preventing influenza when given to an individual who is not sick but has exposed to a person with swine influenza.

It can reduce the possibility of infection by 70% to 90%. The duration of intake will be determined by the condition of the patient. Currently, there are no accessible vaccines for protecting against H1N1.

In order to keep yourself from getting infected by the virus, here are some of the things that can be done:

– Keep yourself informed about H1N1. You can visit the official website of the World Health Organization or check brochures from local hospitals or medical facilities.
– Since the influenza virus can be transmitted from one person to another through coughing or sneezing, you can keep yourself busy by doing the following:

– When coughing or sneezing, cover your nose and mouth with a tissue. After using the tissue, dispose of it and throw it in the trash.
– Wash your hands with soap and water after coughing and sneezing. Use alcohol-based hand sanitizers whenever necessary.
– To prevent germs from spreading, refrain from touching your eyes, mouth, or nose.
– If you become ill, the CDC recommends that you avoid contact with other people at work or school so as not to infect them.
– Comply with public health advice concerning school closures, crowd avoidance, and social distancing efforts.

As far as swine flu is concerned, health authorities are doing everything they can to prevent the outbreak of another deadly virus.

How Serious Is Swine Flu?

The United Kingdom has become the latest country to confirm cases of the swine flu. At the same time, the World Health Organization has raised its alert level from 3 to 4. With 150 people already killed in Mexico, the WHO revealed that the influenza virus has the sustainability for human-to-human transmission and can cause community level outbreaks.

One can recall a similar outbreak known as bird flu which was more risky than H1N1 virus. According to Professor Neil Ferguson of the World Health Organization, H1N1 is nothing when compared to other similar outbreaks such as SARS or the 1918 Spanish flu.

According to the professor, the evidence is clear that the United Kingdom is headed for a swine influenza pandemic in the coming months. However, it would be difficult to determine the extent of the epidemic since this is usually the time of the year when flu is prominent in the United Kingdom.

It is likewise almost sure that if the H1N1 outbreak disappears in the coming weeks, there might still be an outbreak of the virus in the autumn. If the situation indeed transforms into an epidemic, then 30% – 40% of the general population might become susceptible to infection. Professor Ferguson believes that any outbreak might become longer since the summer season in the United Kingdom is fast approaching.

On the other hand, Sir Liam Donaldson, who is concurrent Chief Medical Officer for England, believes that this new strain of H1N1 virus is something which people has natural immunity and has not received any vaccination yet. For this reason, one becomes susceptible to infection and spread to other people.
However, there is no sufficient information about the virus yet and H1N1 is still a subject of studies by major laboratories in the world. Once there is sufficient information about the virus, only then can it be possible to make improved predictions about individuals who are at higher risk and likely to have serious complications.

At present, the situation in Mexico is creating confusion and it is hard to make a firm a conclusion about what is likely to happen. In any case, there is a need to be ready for any untoward incidents that may happen.

Professor John Oxford, meanwhile, believes that the H1N1 outbreak is not as alarming as the H5N1 bird flu virus. He believes that the country can provide the basic H1N1 immunity for the population. The outbreaks outside of Mexico have not resulted to deaths which is an indication that the virus is not that aggressive.

Aside from that, the summer months is fast approaching so it is less probable for the H1N1 virus to cause an outbreak as well. In any case, the United Kingdom has enough antiviral medicines to treat half of the population.

With this in mind, there is no cause for worry about the H1N1 virus, as it appears that it would cause an outbreak that would be felt all over the world and increase mortality rates.

The outbreak of H1N1 began in Mexico City and as of today has resulted to the death of 42 people and more than 800 confirmed cases of swine flu infection. Although it has now spread in 22 countries, it is believed that this new virus outbreak would not be result to a pandemic and is milder than similar virus infections.

H1N1 Flu (Swine Flu)

Responsible for binding the virus to host cells is called the HA (hemagglutinin) peplomer while the virus that allows to break its bonds to the host cell once it is ready to move on is called the NA (neuraminidase) peplomer. This type is also called H1N1 Flu or well-known as Swine Flu. Swine flu is a type of virus infected from pigs. Humans do not normally get swine flu, but human infections can and do happen.

But, randomly, the human race got infected with Swine flu. Most frequently, these cases occur in persons with direct exposure to pigs (example: owner and or workers in the swine backyard or industry or even the children near pigs at a fair).

The virus is contagious and can spread from human to human. Symptoms of swine flu in people are similar to the symptoms of regular human flu such as cough, fever, body aches, sore throat, chills, fatigue and headache.
Swine Flu is a respiratory track infection from the hogs. This kind of virus can kill the human race just like what happen to a pregnant woman and another individual in Texas with also reported death in Washington. This infection is a worldwide virus outbreak that started in Mexico and eventually spread from one country to another continent including China.

A flu deadly disease occurs when a new influenza virus emerges for which people have little or no immunity at all and those whom their hospitals are more than 10 to 20 miles from their community can easily infected with the Swine Flu. The transmission of human to human of Swine flu can also be done.

This is thought to happen in the same way as seasonal flu occurs in people, which is mainly through coughing or sneezing of people infected with the influenza virus to an uninfected individual will be infected also. People may also become infected by touching something with flu viruses on it and then they touch their mouth or nose. The disease spreads easily by human to human transmission and can be cause with serious sickness, and can spread to other individuals in your community, spread out across the country and even worldwide in a very short period of time.

A big NO-NO to some individuals who think that swine flu can also get from foods we eat. Take note that influenza viruses cannot be transmitted by food by means of eating pork or pork products. Eating properly handled and properly cooked pork is safe.

Swine Flu can be monitor if you consult to your health officer directly if you are not feeling well for more than 24 hours especially if you have a hog race industry in your backyard. They will advice you on how to plan, prepare and prevent the Swine Flu virus that spread out worldwide.

Don’t Touch That Pork: A Few Swine Flu Truths And

Don’t Touch That Pork: A Few Swine Flu Truths And Myths

With all the wailing and gnashing of teeth involved with the latest flu outbreak, I think it’s time we set a few things straight about the swine flu. Think of it as a little public service announcement just to shock some of you out of that panic and get you thinking straight.

First of all, pork is safe. Yes, I know it’s called swine flu but it’s nothing like mad cow disease. That’s why there’s a flu at the end instead of disease, of course. The disease spreads via the same way normal flu spreads: contact with a contaminated area or person then contact with either the eyes, nose, or mouth of the prospective infected. Cooked pork can’t possibly be ever infected because cooking and preparation make sure that the meat is clean and healthy for consumption. So, yeah, no need to worry about the ham and bacon in the supermarket.

Secondly, there’s a treatment. Zanamivir and oseltamivir are neuroaminidase inhibitors which is a fancy description of what they do; they’re a type of antiviral drugs that inhibits cell reproduction of viruses so that they won’t spread in the patient’s body. The Center for Disease Control has highly recommended their use for the treatment and control of the disease. Actually, if you find yourself sick, you can do initial treatment via the normal over-the-counter antibiotics that you use when dealing with the normal flu. These can help make the symptoms more bearable and help your body resist the disease better. Those and quite a bit of bed rest can go a long way to make you feel better.

Thirdly, it’s not gonna kill us all. Even at the height of the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic, with its more than fifty million worldwide death count, the human race wasn’t exactly in danger. Plagues and diseases have been a part of human civilization and history for years. Humans have a way of surviving and infections eventually burn out, one of the disadvantages of killing your hosts too quickly. The bodycount may pile high but no natural disease can eliminate the human species that easily. Besides, like I mentioned earlier, it is treatable and you can recover from it.

Fourth, it’s not that contagious. Okay, yeah, it’s contagious, but like all diseases it has its particular infection vectors and if you know those vectors, a disease can easily be avoided. In this case, swine flu it may be, but it’s still the flu. This means it spreads through the contact points I said earlier. Regularly washing your hands before eating is a step in the right direction and, also, not hanging around sick people, though that one should be pretty obvious.

Fifth, it’s still the flu. The description maybe a bit vague and the name exotic, but it’s still the flu in the beginning. You’ll know you’re from it the same way you know you’re sick from the flu: colds, coughs, chills, and fatigue. That’s the initial stuff though. If you were smart, you’d have taken your antibiotics and lessened the effects. If you’re okay after a few days, that was just the normal flu. However, if the symptoms persist, and you start to vomit or start to suffer from diarrhea, then it’s swine flu and you better call for a doctor.

Well, that’s all then. Hopefully, these bits of information help clear up a few things about the swine flu and help you to undestand the currect situation the world is in.