mildly alarming h1n1 reports
mood: 
uncomfortable
uncomfortableFrom the article: John Law, spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Resources, said the information his agency has is that the likelihood of getting the virus twice is "very, very, very rare."
"Once you have had it, you have a natural immunity to it. It's like the mumps or the chicken pox," Law said.
Problem with this? Chicken pox can recur spontaneously via the virus taking up residence in the body and never leaving. So...I'm not really comforted by his statement. We still know far too little about the behavior and life cycles of viruses to be making such bland announcements.
The reason for this post? Romy's sickly again and we're not sure what's going on there. We'll be keeping a close eye on this.
Few days ago I talked with my local chemist about the swine flu and whether to get the vaccine or not, and she told me this. Basically, the swine flu is exactly the same virus from the Spanish flu from forty years ago.
True, right now the illness is very mild, milder than the seasonal flu, but so was the Spanish flu when it first got around back then. It was only after about six months that it was making its way around the world that it mutated in the much more aggressive virus that killed so many people, included people who had already contracted the sickness in the first bout.
My chemist told me to get the vaccine done as soon as it's available. She said that these new generation vaccines are composed by parts and separated proteins from the virus, and not the dead virus. So it both reduces the risk of getting sick from the vaccine, and it should also give more coverage for many possible variations of the virus.
Thinking back about it, I have realized that most the people who died from the swine flu (at least i my country) were, beside already gravely sick with other illnesses, younger than 45, and therefore too young to have the antibodies from the old Spanish flu.
So, bottom line. Despite the doubts on the vaccine and the H1N1 flu being so mild now, I'm getting vaccinated as soon as I possibly can, and so will my siblings.