Word: swine
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That fluidity was perhaps the only certainty of the fast-changing situation. On Monday morning, a 5.6 earthquake in Mexico added to that country's woes, where the death count from suspected swine flu cases had climbed to 152 and more than 1,600 people across the nation had fallen ill. So far, laboratories have confirmed only 26 of Mexico's cases, including seven deaths, as swine flu. In an effort to stem further spread of the apparently deadly disease, the Mexican government announced that all schools would be closed until at least...
...swine flu cases were also confirmed in Canada, Scotland, Spain and the U.S., where the number of confirmed cases more than doubled to 43 - 28 of them students at the same New York City high school. (All the U.S. patients have thus far recovered with few complications.) The deteriorating situation prompted the U.S. State Department to recommend that travelers postpone "nonessential travel" to Mexico - even after U.S. officials criticized the European Union for issuing a travel ban to the U.S. and Mexico. (See five things you need to know about swine...
...also announced that it would begin the process of preparing a swine flu vaccine strain. But the agency recommended that drug companies continue to make a seasonal flu vaccine instead of switching immediately to the production of an A/H1N1 flu vaccine. That's important because drugmakers are currently producing a flu vaccine for the southern hemisphere, where the flu season has just begun. (The flu season in the north has just ended.) If vaccine manufacturing capacity were switched from the standard flu to swine flu, that could create a shortfall in normal flu vaccine, potentially leading to needless deaths should...
...unnecessary panic. "This is obviously a cause for concern," said President Barack Obama in a speech to the National Academy of Sciences on Monday morning. "But it's not a cause for alarm." That message was echoed by Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, the lead federal official on swine flu, as well as WHO officials and just about every other official connected to the global flu response who spoke to the public on Monday...
...clearly too late for that now - the swine flu virus has jumped across borders, and both the WHO and CDC have acknowledged that containment is no longer an option. So, while raising the alert level, the WHO also recommended that countries do not close borders or impose travel bans. "Restricting travel would have very little effect on stopping the movement of this virus," said Fukuda. At this point, trying to close borders would be like closing the barn door after the horse has bolted - better to focus on community-level protections like better disease surveillance and hygiene. (Read "Battling Swine...