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Change of Menu Options At My House Tonight!

Swine Flu Prompts Quarantines, Government Actions

April 26, 2009       Leave a Comment
By: MyBayCity Staff

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Menu options at my house changed today from pork chops to steak!
 

I awoke this Sunday morning at 5:00 a.m. to news of additional cases of swine flu in the United States, bringing the total up to 20 infected persons. This prompted me to research what exactly it is and how it is spreading so quickly into our territory.

I have to admit, this scares me.

Swine flu is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type "A" flu viruses, the CDC's Web site says. Human cases of swine flu are uncommon but can happen in people who are around pigs and can be spread from person to person. Symptoms of the flu include a fever of more than 100 degrees, body aches, coughing, a sore throat, respiratory congestion and, in some cases, vomiting and diarrhea.

Health officials are worried because people appear to have no immunity to the virus, a combination of bird, swine and human influenza.

It appears to be able to transmit easily between humans.

On Thursday it was reported a total of seven cases in the United States.

Friday it was reported that we have one additional case here in the United States in California, bringing the total in the United States to eight.

As of today, Sunday, it was reported in the New York Times that and additional eight students from New York City have been confirmed to have contracted swine flu, and there have been 11 confirmed cases in California, Kansas and Texas.

New York health officials said more than 100 students at the private St. Francis Preparatory School, in Queens, had come down with a fever, sore throat and other aches and pains in the past few days. Some of their relatives also have been ill.

The 20 U.S. swine flu victims range in age from 9 to over 50, including the announcement of a 9 year old boy in Ohio as I am writing this column.

With concern rising over the Swine Flu, the White House announced today an unusual Sunday briefing on the outbreak. The U.S. also declared a public health emergency Sunday, featuring Secretary Janet Napolitano, Department of Homeland Security; Dr. Richard Besser, Acting Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.

This seems to be growing by the hour here in the United States and I must say, my menu option for dinner tonight has quickly changed from pork chops to steak, even though it has been stated by the Center for Disease Control that people cannot catch swine flu from eating pork or pork products "if cooked properly"!

Countries planned quarantines, tightened rules on pork imports and tested airline passengers for fevers as global health officials tried Sunday to come up with uniform ways to battle a deadly strain of swine flu. Nations from New Zealand to France reported new suspected cases and some warned citizens against travel to North America.

World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan held teleconferences with staff and flu experts around the world but stopped short of recommending specific measures to halt the disease beyond urging governments to step up their surveillance of suspicious outbreaks.

Governments including China, Russia and Taiwan began planning to put anyone with symptoms of the deadly virus under quarantine.

Asian health authorities were on alert Sunday, with some checking passengers and pork products from Mexico, as the World Health Organization declared the deadly swine flu outbreak a public health emergency!

Others were increasing their screening of pigs and pork imports from the Americas or banning them outright despite health officials' reassurances that it was safe to eat thoroughly cooked pork.

Some nations issued travel warnings for Mexico and the United States.

Chan called the outbreak a public health emergency of "pandemic potential" because the virus can pass from human to human.Her agency was considering whether to issue nonbinding recommendations on travel and trade restrictions, and even border closures. It is up to governments to decide whether to follow the advice.

"Countries are encouraged to do anything that they feel would be a precautionary measure," WHO spokeswoman Aphaluck Bhatiasevi said. "All countries need to enhance their monitoring."

New Zealand said that 10 students who took a school trip to Mexico "likely" had swine flu. Israel said a man who had recently visited Mexico had been hospitalized while authorities try to determine whether he had the disease. French Health Ministry officials said four possible cases of swine flu are currently under investigation, including a family of three in the northern Nord region and a woman in the Paris region. The four recently returned from Mexico. Tests on two separate cases of suspected swine flu proved negative, they said.

Spain's Health Ministry said three people who just returned from Mexico were under observation in hospitals in the northern Basque region, in southeastern Albacete and the Mediterranean port city of Valencia.

Mexico closed schools, museums, libraries and theaters in a bid to contain the outbreak after hundreds were sickened there. In the U.S., there have been at least 11 confirmed cases of swine flu in California, Texas and Kansas. Patients have ranged in age from 9 to over 50. At least two were hospitalized. All recovered or are recovering.

New York health officials said more than 100 students at the St. Francis Preparatory School, in Queens, recently began suffering a fever, sore throat and aches and pains. Some of their relatives also have been ill.

Some St. Francis students had recently traveled to Mexico, The New York Times and New York Post reported Sunday.

Preliminary tests of samples taken from sick students' noses and throats confirmed that at least eight had a non-human strain of influenza type A, indicating probable cases of swine flu, city health officials said. The exact subtypes were still unknown, and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was conducting further tests.

Hong Kong and Taiwan said visitors who came back from flu-affected areas with fevers would be quarantined. China said anyone experiencing flu-like symptoms within two weeks of arrival an affected area had to report to authorities. A Russian health agency said any passenger from North America running a fever would be quarantined until cause of the fever is determined.

Tokyo's Narita airport installed a device to test the temperatures of passengers arriving from Mexico.

Indonesia increased surveillance at all entry points for travelers with flu-like symptoms - using devices at airports that were put in place years ago to monitor for severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, and bird flu. It said it was ready to quarantine suspected victims if necessary.

Hong Kong and South Korea warned against travel to the Mexican capital and three affected provinces. Italy, Poland and Venezuela also advised their citizens to postpone travel to affected areas of Mexico and the United States.

Symptoms of the flu-like illness include a fever of more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit (37.8 degrees Celsius), body aches, coughing, a sore throat, respiratory congestion and, in some cases, vomiting and diarrhea.

At least 81 people have died from severe pneumonia caused by the disease in Mexico, according to the WHO (World Health Organization).

The virus is usually contracted through direct contact with pigs, but Joseph Domenech, chief of animal health service at U.N. Food and Agriculture Agency in Rome, said all indications were that the virus is being spread through human-to-human transmission.

No vaccine specifically protects against swine flu, and it is unclear how much protection current human flu vaccines might offer.

Russia banned the import of meat products from Mexico, California, Texans and Kansas. South Korea said it would increase the number of its influenza virus checks on pork products from Mexico and the U.S.

Serbia on Saturday banned all imports of pork from North America, despite reassurances from the FAO that pigs appear not to be the immediate source of infection.

Italy's agriculture lobby, Coldiretti, warned against panic reaction, noting that farmers lost hundreds of millions of euros (dollars) because of consumers boycotts during the 2001 mad cow scare and the 2005 bird flu outbreak.

Japanese Agriculture Minister Shigeru Ishiba appeared on TV to calm consumers, saying it was safe to eat pork.

In Egypt, health authorities were examining about 350,000 pigs being raised in Cairo and other provinces for swine flu.

The WHO's pandemic alert level is currently at to phase 3. The organization said the level could be raised to phase 4 if the virus shows sustained ability to pass from human to human.

Phase 5 would be reached if the virus is found in at least two countries in the same region.

"The declaration of phase 5 is a strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time to finalize the organization, communication, and implementation of the planned mitigation measures is short," WHO said.

Phase 6 would indicate a full-scale global pandemic.

This has already affected those in the United States, Hong Kong, Israel, Taiwan, China, Mexico, Spain, France, New Zealand ... what is to come in following days ...

Even though the Center for Disease Control states "that people cannot catch swine flu from eating pork or pork products. Cooking pork to an internal temperature of 160 degrees Fahrenheit kills the swine flu virus." Nonetheless, I am not willing to take that risk! It's steak for dinner at my house.

NOTE: Research from numerous Associated Press articles around the globe, the CDC, WHO and The White House websites, contributed to information contained in this article.

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