Preparing Yourself for Swine Flu: What to Do Now

The swine flu is likely top of mind for you and your family. But with all the news sources available today, and social networking venues like Facebook and Twitter passing along information, it’s hard to know what to believe and what not to consider fact or truth. Here at Insider's Health, we’ve tapped into the expertise of Dr. Mark Jerome Walters, D.V.M. who has some interesting information to share regarding the future of swine flu and the possibility of a pandemic. Keep reading to find out what you can do now . . .


Waiting in the Shadows?
 
In truth, experts have been warning of a worldwide outbreak of a horrific influenza ever since 1997, when the first human cases of so-called H5N1 avian influenza were reported in Hong Kong. 
 
Two years ago the news was filled with a similar threat – bird flu. We got lucky.  The threat didn’t ripen into a pandemic.   Now we are watching and waiting to see what happens with another type of influenza – swine flu.
 
A spate of ominous mounting human cases has suddenly cast the threat of a pandemic into the headlines once again:  The alarming trends have led many public health experts to shed their normally cautious language when talking about the flu. The World Health Organization (WHO), in Geneva, Switzerland, recently raised the pandemic alert level to 4--just one step away from the likely beginnings of a pandemic. 
 
If a severe pandemic does occur, nobody knows how many people will get sick or how many will die. The death toll could be in the millions.
 
The Four Most Important Websites
 
Confirmed cases of swine flu in the U.S. can be tracked on CDC's website here and recent swine flu news from the World Health Organization is posted here. If you are contemplating travel you can get the most recent traveler’s health information here and (Editor's note) to give your immune system the power to help protect you against swine flu, get your free trial of Mangoberry here!
 
Preparations To Take & Precautions to Implement
 
People can take basic steps to prepare themselves and their families for the worst.  While these two simple actions may seem like a pittance in the face of a swine flu pandemic, they could help to decrease your chances of infection.
 
1.  Take the time now to learn about swine flu.  This will help you begin preparing emotionally for an event that may now be hard to comprehend.  Those who have prepared themselves emotionally and intellectually will be able to act quickly and wisely while the unprepared are still struggling with denial and inaction.
 
2.  Get in a habit of practicing the basic CDC-recommended hygiene techniques that you should have been practicing all along (but probably haven’t): 
 

• Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze, and throw the tissue away after you use it.
• Try not to touch your eyes, nose, or mouth since germs can spread this way.  Your children will learn this quickly if you teach them.
• Get in the habit of washing your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. If you are not near water, use an alcohol-based hand cleaner.  Although influenza spreads by respiratory droplets from coughing and sneezing, it can be carried on other surfaces.  
  

3. Buy some face masks now.  I have taken the modest step of buying (for a few  dollars each) some face masks to have on hand in case the pandemic begins, although their effectiveness is limited in blocking transmission of the tiny influenza virus. (Masks with a rating of N95 or higher are apt to be more protective.) Such masks may be in short supply if/when a pandemic begins. 
 
4. Plan ways to minimize your contact with others as you conduct essential business. To be sure, if a swine flu pandemic arrives, it will not be up to parents to send their children to school or not.  Schools will be shut down. Large public gatherings, such as sporting events, will be prohibited.  However, the small decisions you make every day will help to determine how many potentially infected people you come into contact with. 
 
Summary
The recent trend of events suggests that time and luck may be running out.  It would be prudent, then, to assume that a pandemic is on its way.  If it doesn’t materialize over the next few weeks, we will be better educated and prepared when the next one does.
 
Our country has proven capable of preparing for the unthinkable.  Nothing has been spared in the fight against terrorism.  And while the pandemic will not be intentional, no one could imagine a worse form of biological terror.

* Special thanks to Mark Jerome Walters for his contribution of this article. Dr. Walters is a veterinarian and the author of Six Modern Plagues and How We Are Causing Them (Island Press, 2004).  A Visiting Lecturer at Harvard Medical School from 2001-2003, he is currently a professor at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg.

Stay tuned for more information in Monday's newsletter as we follow the spread of the swine flu and the possibility of a global pandemic.