One flu over the pig sty.

Hello fellow H1N1 (Swine flu for people who havent cared to heard about the WHO renaming ceremony) potential victims. Lo behold! Are you completely prepared for the next disaster to strike our country after Rakhi ka swayamvar??!! If not, good, you should read ahead and if you are, it is even more imperative that you read ahead.

Some Basic facts about disease first.

1. Flu like diseases are caused by probably the smallest creatures known to man that are viruses. When I say smallest I mean they reach sizes of a few nano metres which is like really small.
2. These viruses are usually present in our nasal secretions and sometimes in our lungs too.
3. When we sneeze or spit, we actually expel relatively large droplets in the air. These are visible and settle down somewhere due to gravity. Some of the small ones though float in the air carrying infective germs including viruses in cases of infected persons.
4. These small droplets can be very tiny and invisible to the naked eye and linger in the air for hours or even days. These can happen also while sweeping places with spit.
5. The most prominent disease spreading by this route in our country is Tuberculosis to which most of our population is exposed to by the time we are a few years old thanks to it being around everywhere. More about it later.
6. A desperate plea: Please Do Not Spit and stop others from spitting.
   

Now about everyone's favourite little obsession The Swine Flu.

1. History of the Flu first : The Flu is caused by the influenza virus. The most important quality of the virus is that it keeps on changing itself constantly. Yes. Constantly. It has and will continue to.
   
2. The countries where a flu vaccine is recommended advise taking it every year because the virus changes itself that frequently. These are usually small changes.
3. Occasionally there is a big change in the virus which has happened 2-3 times in the last century if I remember correctly. And has happened now. So No Big Deal.
4. This time it's the H1N1.
   
5. So basically its just a new form of the regular Flu. It is Not a deadly disease. It is as deadly as any other flu can be and definitely much less dangerous than many other diseases much more common in our country.
6. Now comes the spread. Yes, it has a propensity to spread very quickly among contacts of the infected and that is probably it's only ominous part.
7. Which brings us to prevention: As I mentioned earlier, viruses spread by the large and small droplets. Now the small droplets being very minute have no problem crossing the simple masks, handkerchiefs, dupattas etc that people are using. The sides of those things are anyway open and the cloth has pores in it. The large droplets do however get stopped by them.
8. This is why masks are most useful in patients and people with symptoms who would sneeze out big droplets which would be stopped by the masks. And also for the same reason, they are useful for close contacts of infected people and health professionals as they would come in contact with the large droplets. Remember this.
9. The best and probably only prevention is avoidance of people with the flu as much as possible and if you still want to use the masks, they are supposed to be used only once.

Now that the facts are out for you to take conclusions from let me tell you something.
Swine flu is spreading very fast all over the world. True. That is why it is a pandemic. Duh!
But believe me, it is nothing to be scared about. It is to be aware about as much as any other disease. You drink clean water, don't you? You don't want an upset stomach. You should know that even normal diarrhoea kills more people that the so called swine flu. And you are not scared of diarrhoea are you? You just take care as much as possible to avoid it. That's all you have to do with H1N1. Even if you get the flu, it would most probably be just like any other flu. I can assure you there are thousands of people in the country infected with the virus and the death count at present is 27. There can be other reasons for the deaths too because of the general diseased state and it just could be because of the disease but even in that case the probability is very less and treatment available. Malaria kills much much more people and spreads easily. How many of you are scared of mosquitoes?
Fact is the case mortality rate is 0.5%. 1 person may die in 200 diseased people.
The new channels have hyped it beyond reason. And since that has caught the attention of the public, the health ministry has to look like it is taking it seriously.
I read in a newspaper article a few days back that 16 children 'survived' swine flu. It made me laugh really. Survival is really not an issue here, containment of spread is. It is sad that such biased and partially correct journalism is spreading a completely wrong picture of the disease. Please be aware of it.
Don't fall prey to the incessant hype. Be fairly careful and stop people from spitting. I wonder if there are those who lift up their masks and spit..hehe.
Tuberculosis kills 2 people every 3 seconds in India and it spreads by spitting. Please be more worried about that.