Interesting info about swine flu virus

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/05/nine-confirmed-cases-of-swine-flu-in-illinois.html

Encouraging swine flu signs seen

May 4, 2009 9:33 PM

More than a dozen schools across the Chicago area will remain closed Tuesday, while almost as many will have reopened as health officials say they continue to see encouraging signs about a swine flu outbreak that so far has been little more severe than seasonal flu.

Schools and day care centers continued to close Monday, affecting families with children in at least 17 schools around Chicago. Another eight schools reopened, and at least three more will reopen Tuesday, officials said.

Early lab tests on the swine flu virus have not found the genetic factors commonly associated with previous, more severe pandemics, Richard Besser, acting director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, said at a news conference in Atlanta Monday. Likewise, there has been little variation between samples, a sign of a less adaptive virus that could make it easier to develop a vaccine. snip

One oddity in the outbreak is that this swine flu has affected mostly younger patients, CDC officials confirmed. Of the confirmed cases in the U.S., two thirds are under 18.

The original H1N1 virus behind the deadly 1918 pandemic likely circulated among humans continuously until the 1950s, and then disappeared by 1957, according to the CDC.

Researchers said they are trying to determine whether people born prior to 1957 have an immunity to the H1N1 virus.

[ananda]

1. Yes, I think you can look at natural selection..

.. for answers to why the virus is so
mild in the USA.

When I was young, I got the flu three
or four times.

The last time I remember getting the flu
was February 1961. And I know I had it
at least twice before that...

I have never gotten the flu in my adult life.
And believe me, as a teacher, I WAS exposed....

[NNN0LHI]

2. Remember the Hong Kong Flu Pandemic (1968-1969)?

I caught that one. I thought I was going to die. I felt like it anyway.

Don

[northofdenali]

3. Don, I sure do remember that sucker -

I was a freshman in high school and we ALL thought we were going to die - especially considering the lack of doctors and general health care in Fairbanks, Alaska that far back.

I haven't had a "serious" flu since, despite my less-than-optimal immune system (fibromyalgia). My mom is 93, and hasn't had a flu shot in 20 years - because the shots made her sicker than the flu did.

I think accessible health care, and general overall health of the population, account for a lot of the more serious cases and deaths in this instance.

[MineralMan]

4. Oh, yes. I was really sick with that one.

As soon as flu shots started being available, I started getting them. I hate being sick.

[SheilaT]

5. I think I got flu several

times as a child, and like you have not gotten it in years. And years. And years. On rare occasions I've had some of the typical flu symptoms, fever and that all-over aching, but invariably it's never lasted more than two days. I might have gotten the version that was out there in 1957, but I know I didn't get it in 1978-68, the Hong Kong flu.

I likewise am not a fan of flu shots. They do make sense for a relatively small group of people, but the recent push for EVERYONE, including very young children, to get a flu shot, strikes me as a very bad idea.

And I wouldn't be surprised if most people born before 1957, who were for the most part exposed to the Asian flu, have at least some degree of immunity. What's generally not known is that the main reason the elderly didn't get the 1918 flu was that about fifty years earlier there had been a flu epidemic of a similar strain, so most people who had lived through the earlier epidemic were now immune.

[NNN0LHI]

6. I agree fully with what you say and especially your last sentence

Plus back in 1918 the elderly didn't get out too much I bet. By the time they got the horses hooked up to the buggy a lot of them were probably too tired to go anywhere.

Don