There are less death rates because people take it seriously. If people started going all "swine flu is like the common cold", like in Malaysia and Mexico, it starts spreading, and people start dying.
In a word. No.
The vast majority of the quarter-to-half a million deaths per year that can be contributed to influenza are in people who are over 65 and have other health problems; the influenza doesn't kill them, it just weakens them enough that their present illnesses can get a clear run.
Swine influenza has matched seasonal influenza almost perfectly, there are only really three notable things about it that make it anything worth being concerned about.
Firstly, there are no vaccines to fight it, this makes the doctors a bit nervous since they're used to having their flu vaccines.
Secondly, the few confirmed deaths directly related to swine influenza have mostly been in younger people, this is a bit of an abberration as influenza normally hits the elderly worst.
The third interesting and perhaps the most important thing about it in that a very small fraction of the people who get it (we're talking less than 1%) become incredibly, unbelievably sick. In these cases the disease seems totally different from it's usual state and it actively and aggressively attacks the lungs, resulting in serious damage.
It's this small percentage that really has the doctors worried, and it's also this small percentage that was blown completely out of proportion by media fearmongering. As of yet the exact reason why swine influenza suddenly becomes so hostile in certain cases remains unknown, but preliminary studies suggests that it may be linked to genetic variations in immune systems, hence why the majority of deaths from this 'kind' of swine influenza tend to be grouped together.
However, in every other case the swine influenza is substantially less virulent than normal influenza, usually lasting little more than a week or two and being not much worse than a cold. This in itself is a problem, as the vast majority of these people don't peg their illness as swine flu and they certainly get no media time, so it looks substantially worse than it is.
Swine influenza most certainly has the potential to be a serious problem, but then so does Ebola and a dozen other virulent and potentially lethal illnesses. The only remarkable thing about swine influenza is that the media latched onto it as a means to sell newspapers.
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Topic: Swine Flu vs. Regular Flu? (Read 2363 times)