Lets get this into perspective: Quick Survey -Do you know anyone that has had/has Swine Flu?

[NorbertDentressangle]

...and I don't mean that you've "heard that someone at X school/street/place" has had it, I mean someone that you actually know really has had it/has got it.

I don't know anyone that has and wondered if thats the case for the majority of people on here or not?

I've got it, dh has it, we think the kids had it last week, though didn't present all the symptoms, my friends son had it last week.

where is the epidemiologist MNer to put us right on this?

This virus seems to be easy to catch but low mortality?

no

Not trying to alarm anyone but surely it is only a few weeks away from us all being exposed given that the spread will go through an exponential phase. Again need the experts to comment.

tdiddy, I thought you promised not to be alarmist!

There is much useful and balanced info on the WHO website for those who are interested.

I'm off for a bar of chocolate.

My friend's son had it (diagnosed, but don't think they've swabbed) and now she's got same symptoms.

mumonthenet- we havve been living with deadly viruses for a very very long time now! And SF so far doesn't look like one. When i visited East Africa twelve years ago (i think), Ebola was kicking around and is still there.

When I got it I have to say it scared the hell out of me, the media had hyped it up so much and then with my health issues I thought, that's it i'm a gonna, but if I had never heard of swine flu I would have thought it a really heavy cold I had picked up that was trying really hard to get onto my chest.

Others have few symptoms (a light cold).

Hardly worth injecting an untried vaccine into our kids for herd immunity, the herd will already have had it.

Are you now okay Atlantis?

We have just had it and my mum has just had it.

7 people in my DS class in the last week, including his BF. A little concerned now as I'm 16 wks pg and asthmatic - so really dont want it coming back to my house!

Me. Since yesterday afternoon. AM now starting to feel quite ropey.

OOOOOo Riven - Happy Birthday!

Pork pie with a birthday candle in?

Nope, nobody that I know, or know of has had it.

No one that I know although we had a letter from dd's school saying that a TA had got it.

One of dd's best friends at school has it - first case in the school, but the community college has had quite a few cases in the last week or so, so we're expecting more now.

about 10 people.

a few cases in the nursery, some at school and some at work.

I also think we may all have had it in mid-June. We had ALL the symptoms, all beginning with sudden onset high fever, aches, VERY sore throat, cough, and mixed gastric symptoms (2/3 kids vomited, rest of us had a bit of diarrhoea). Lasted 3 days with another 3 days or so of exhaustion after that. But two youngest kids then developed a rash and so GP decided it was strep infection.

Very soon after however, DH also had an awful lasting cough. GP thought asthma but prescribed ABs just in case. Cough cleared up within 48 hrs of ABs.

Putting it all together (we live and work in a place with a lot of human 'through' traffic!), relatively close to the Midlands hotspots, I am hoping convinced we have all had it already.

I wonder how many other people have a similar, undiagnosed but 'could be?' experience also? No-one was interested in swabbing us because there were no confirmed cases locally at that point (not true, in the end, there were a handful) and we hadn't been to Mexico.

Perhaps it was something else. I dunno.

I have probably had it at the same time they confirmed a case at DS's school and two at DD's. DS has been off colour ie. temp just under 38, cough and cold, but it seems very different to what I had.

DD's friend had flu a couple of weeks ago but the doctor just said flu and not swine flu so who knows.

But hte policy is not to swab now (that was only in the containment phase). So clinical diagnosis (ie your GP or phoneline deciding it is based on symptoms) IS the only form of confirmation.

HPA are collecting sample data around the country to try and estimate cases. They call it 'influenza-like illness' in order to be able to say we don't really know but we think etc..

There has been a sharp rise in June/July IIRC.

And there are hotspots: where we are in the Midlands, it is everywhere. Other places not yet hit so bad. As is the way with viruses.

I think I have a mild dose, got a bad cough, sore throat, runny nose, mild temperature.

also comfirmed case in DD's class and the wife of a colleague at work.

I know noone that has had it.
Not a soul.