Sensible, non-panicking Swine flu measures?

[bella29]

Just wondered.....

they (a doctor) said on my local BBC radio station this morning that it would be wise to set by a stock of paracetamol, calpol etc. just in case.

Anything else you are doing?

From what I understood the 'normal' flu virus is different every year/flu season anyway as it mutates. You have to create different antibodies to fight each strain anyway. I thought that with swine flu because it is a strain found in pigs not humans that has travelled across they were unsure of how it would present itself in humans, but from what the WHO have been saying it is not as bad as they thought and seems to be presenting itself in a very similar manner to ordinary human flu. If the drugs they are using to treat it are working now yes it could mutate to be different & not respond, but 'normal' flu mutates and presents different symptoms anyway IYSWIM. Which is how come you can have more than one type of flu in a year/lifetime as your immune system has antibodies only for the strains of flu you get. Of course I am open to the fact that I could be way off the mark here but I really don't think that buying in stuff 'just incase' is necessary at this point. We only have 13 confirmed cases & it seems to be fairly well contained, and we have a population of what, around 60-70million?! Just stay away from people that have been to Mexico!

But the standard flu which mutates every year is closely related to the one you may have had the year before or a few years ago so it is likely that you will have more resistance to it than to a completely new strain. At least that's how I understood it to work. Can someone who actually knows what they are talking about come and tell us the truth, please?!

bebejones - you can't just stay away from people who have been to Mexico

To me the reasonable course of action seems to be:

Prepare to be confined at home for a week - just in case. Make sure you have enough of your prescription medications and otc meds to see you though a bout of illness cos if it does spread and if you catch it then you arent going to be popping to the supermarket for supplies.

Make sure you always have tissues with you because if it spreads people are not going to be happy for strangers spreading random sneezes about the place.

Wash your hands like you are supposed to.

Then carry on life as normal.

We are planning a nice day out in London tomrrow looking at the sights. I'm sure we will come across the occasional Mexican or American but we won't be fleeing in terror

DH went to a Mexican restaurant on Friday.

Deserted. Like this

We have no or very very little resistance to this strain of flu, which I think is why so many experts were concerned about how humans would react to it. It can still mutate and become more severe. Normal seasonal flu, most of us will have some resistence to it.

No that's not the point, Riven. It means that people who have less efficient immune systems, like the elderly, the ill, people with cancer, people with lung diseases, can be worst affected.

Well yes, but new bugs that are potentially fatal can in fact wipe out enormous numbers of people. Look at what happened when the previously unknown smallpox hit the Aztecs! As it is, this one looks mild so if it's v contagious the worst we are looking at is lots of people being poorly and stuck at home for a while. Hence stocking up on basics so as not to have to drag oneself to shops and potentially infect others or alternatively so you can stay at home while everyone gets on with being ill and some shops etc are offering a much reduced service. I honestly don't think that is hysteria, just a sensible precaution to take.

Oooo some interesting posts this morning.

Lets look at immunity - we all haev 2 main types. Innate immunity - which is capable of dealing with low level infections and is aimed more at keeping bugs out of the body. It is non-specific and doesn't distinguish (broadly speaking0 between a virus, a bacteria, a yeast or a head lice. This consists of things like skin, mucous membranes, amylase enzymes in teh eye....this can keep out the flu virus in some invidiviuals.

Aquired immunity is what most people think of as "immunity" - this is antibody driven and the bosy does need to have previously seen the organism to have aquired immunity to it. This is the basis of vaccines. Show the body the foreign organism (or part of it) so it knows what to look for in the future. This potential pandemic is a virus which genetically has fragments from avain flu, swine flu adn human flu. What is important though (as far as immunity) is concerned are the proteins on the surface - and although I don't know whether the proteins are from the human, avaian or swine elements they are H1N1 subtypes. My understanding of the way the sub-types work indicates that H1N1 is H1N1 it doesn't really matter whether it is swine, avian or martian. If someone has recently been infected with H1N1 and are fit, healthy, and young they may have some immunity from previous years - although I don't think aquired immunity to influenza is lifelong - so most of us won't be immune (because the last time we saw H1N1 will be too long ago).

They way seasonal flu works is that you tend to get a totally different serotype every year (eg H2N5) so the residual immunity is gone by the time you see H1N1 again. Although mutation within a strain will occr before you see it again it is more that it is a totally different strain from one year to the next that means you need a new vaccine.

And to answer some of the numbers banded about on this thread this morning....

13 people (15 actually) out of a population of 60-70 billion. You are right it is not a lot - but that ratio is irrelevant. What is relevant is 15 people out of x number of people exposed which defines whether it is affecting a "large population". Over 69.9billion people won't have been exposed so you wouldn't expect them to have it! I don't know what x is BTW. This is the VIRULENCE of the organism.

Also comparing the 100 or so deaths from "swine" flu to 5000 from seasonal flu is also the wrong comparison to make. You should be comparing teh death rate to those affected. So in actual fact we are looking at 20 confirmed deaths from about 900 confirmed cases (which is about 2% death rate I think without calculator). We also need to look at the same for seasonal flu - and again I don't actually know how many cases of seasonal flue we have had in teh same period but my understanding is that the normal MORTALITY rate from seasonal flu is about 1%.

Hope that clears up some mis-leading statements without confusing.

Thanks for that helpful post slightlymadSF. Are you a doctor/scientist type?

global population?

Ah. But that would be 6 billion wouldn't it?

Scientist type

Sorry should have been 70 million which is what someone quoted earlier as the UK population (which I trusted cos my geogrpahy is crap)

UK pop is 60-70 million

fortunately my biology/immunology is significantly better than my geography!

I just mis-read the post and knew it was 60-70 somethong ending in illion!!!

Thanks for that, SlightlyMad, v interesting.

I see what you're getting at in that earlier post, SlightlyMadSwineFlu, but some of that isn't right unfortunately.

There are two types of seasonal flu - the ones we get every year - and these are H1N1 and H3N2. Strictly speaking and despite current events, these are still the only pandemic influenza A types. We get them repeatedly every year because of small random point mutations that accumulate over time - called antigenic drift - so that the viruses can subvert the previously effective immune response; but they're still H1N1 and H3N2.

However, influenza A has a genome that is composed of segments, and it is possible that these swap around to create a new HxNx type; a process called antigenic shift. Some of these viruses can infect humans and achieve sustained transmission; but most won't. H5N1 is a good example of one that apparently cannot.

It's worth pointing out that the HxNx identification of a flu A virus is mainly used for identification only, and doesn't necessarily reflect the ability of the virus to cause disease. There are eight segments - two of which are H and N - but the others like NP, M and NS genes can make the difference between a mild and a lethal infection. Thus there are low- and high-pathogenicity versions of H5N1 that affect birds. Similarly there are low- and high pathogenicity H1N1 viruses for humans eg. contrast the relatively low pathogenicity of current swine H1N1 with the 1918 H1N1 virus.

There is one pathogenicity factor located on the H gene; a 15 base-pair repeat which means the virus can be 'activated' by enzymes throughout the human body rather than just in the upper respiratory tract, and which theoretically could allow systemic spread. Fortunately this current swine H1N1 doesn't have it.

eek

Sorry for that I was trying to simplyify all teh HxNx stuff for this thread as it wasn't strictly the subject of the thread.

I didn't realise that there were only 2 seasonal serotypes - I thought they were just teh most common. I appologise for my mis-understanding and consequently the mis-leading. I thought shift (and lack of long term vaccine efficacy to a given strain) were more important factors than drift in determining the neeed for new vaccines for each new season. Again I appologise for mis-leading.

Viology, huh? So you're a violet expert then?

No I just can't blinking type!