May 21, 2009.
O The Swine!
Hey, where did everybody go!? In spite of the fact that the Swine flu travel warning has been lifted for Mexico and the Center for Disease Control is saying “risk of severe disease” from the H1N1 virus “now appears to be less than originally thought”, it sure is quiet around here. It would seem that the swine flu hysteria has sacred everybody away. I suppose anybody would be frightened if they measured the world by the headlines.
Swine flu has been obsessively followed. All 85 people in the world who have died from H1N1 complications have been talked about and talked about. Each new, confirmed case is reported on and there are special maps that keep us up to date on just what is happening. Goodness!
And thank goodness the same isn’t done for seasonal flu, we’d really be freaked out then. They’d have to report on the 800 deaths last week, just in the US, from our run of the mill flu. And the 800 the week before, and the week before…about 16,000 since January 1st. And last year, and average flu year, there were 36,000 seasonal flu related deaths!
So if swine flu is keeping you from traveling to Mexico or elsewhere, the regular flu should be keeping you from walking out your front door. But for some reason, I suspect it isn’t. And here in Mexico swine flu isn’t keeping us indoors either. Life goes on as ever.
I’ve been following the news, digging a bit beyond the headlines and here’s a bit of what I’m hearing:
- Those that are dying from swine flu, like those that die from seasonal flu, have underlying health issues, like the 33 year old man in Texas who recently died from the swine, but also suffered from “morbid obesity, an enlarged heart and an underactive thyroid”.
- Swine flu is likely as mild as regular flu and it is treatable.
- Older folks actually show more immunity to swine flu!
- Prevent Swine flu, like any flu or cold, by washing your hands, eating garlic and vitamin D, exercising and reducing stress in your life by taking a trip to Mexico with Traditions Mexico!! (well, it will reduce my stress)
Below are a few excerpts from recent articles on the subject. Click the link in the title for the full article. And send us an email, it's getting lonely around here.
At your service with clean hands and garlic breath,
Eric Mindling
| Swine flu travel warning lifted for Mexico
LA TIMES 17 May
The national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, Friday lifted its recommendation that U.S. citizens avoid nonessential travel to Mexico because of the swine flu outbreak there, and the U.S. State Department followed suit…
In lifting its warning, the CDC said, “There is evidence that the Mexican outbreak is slowing down in many cities though not all.” It also said that the “risk of severe disease” from the H1N1 virus “now appears to be less than originally thought.”… |
W.H.O. Plans to Rewrite Its Rules for Declaring a Pandemic
New York Times 23 MAY
...the World Health Organization announced Friday that it would rewrite its rules for alerting the world to new diseases, meaning the swine flu circling the globe will probably never be declared a full-fledged pandemic.
Dr. Keiji Fukuda, the deputy director general making the W.H.O. announcement, said that ... (the) criteria would include a “substantial risk of harm to people,” not just the geographic spread of a relatively benign virus. |
Tests show more swine flu immunity in older folks
May 21
ATLANTA (AP) — New test results show what scientists have suspected — people in their 60's and older have greater immunity to the new swine flu virus. |
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Wash your hands. I know this sounds silly, but it is far more effective at preventing flu than having a dose-pack of Tamiflu in the medicine chest. Take it from a doctor, mother and reporter who covered SARS as well as bird flu where they were most virulent…
In a normal season in the United States, tens of thousands of people die of complications of influenza. A baby’s death in Texas or the 200 people who have succumbed in Mexico are tragic cases, but not by themselves worrisome totals. They could even suggest that this strain of swine influenza is quite mild. We have no idea how many people came down with lesser infections — presumably a huge number — that went unrecorded by the public health system…
As a physician, as a student of public health and even as a journalist, I cringe when I see the swine flu, or H1N1, called “the deadly virus.” Evidence to date does not suggest that it is any more deadly than the average flu… |
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New York Times May 15
Dr. Daniel Jernigan, head of flu epidemiology for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,…emphasized that most cases were mild.
The latest death, added Friday, was that of a 33-year-old man in Corpus Christi, Tex. The Associated Press reported that he died May 6 of viral pneumonia and had several health problems, including morbid obesity, an enlarged heart and an underactive thyroid.
At the same news conference, another C.D.C. official announced that the agency planned to lower its alert on travel to Mexico soon. Mexico’s outbreak has not proved as dangerous as it originally seemed.
The agency will no longer suggest that Americans avoid nonessential travel, … Instead, it will suggest that anyone with underlying conditions that might make the flu more severe consult a doctor before traveling. Those conditions, previous reports suggest, include pregnancy, asthma, diabetes or cardiovascular disease. |
James Jay Carafano is a senior research fellow in defense and homeland security at the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for foreign policy studies at the Heritage Foundation.
There are some basic facts that Americans ought to know. The first is that the news coverage is driven more by the unusual nature of the disease than how serious it might be…News stories play fast and loose with terms like “outbreak,” “epidemic,” and “pandemic.” They are not interchangeable. Each describes an increasing degree of the number of infected and the geographical scope of the infection. We are not close to having a pandemic yet. And if we do it may not be anything like a catastrophe. The disease looks to respond to existing medication.
Finally, the swine flu makes news because we can pin it to a location. But it might be premature to call this the “Mexican” flu, just as it turned out it was wrong to call the 1918 pandemic the “Spanish” flu (which scientists think actually first appeared in Kansas).
The bottom line is we do not have near all the facts yet, and the ones we do have so far say: don’t panic, don’t rush to judgment.
For now we should all just wash our hands and go to the doctor if we have flu symptoms. |
How to Protect Yourself Without Dangerous Drugs and Vaccinations
Mercola.com
For now, my point is that there are always going to be threats of flu pandemics, real or created, and there will always be potentially toxic vaccines that are peddled as the solution. But you can break free of that whole drug-solution trap by following some natural health principles.
I have not caught a flu in over two decades, and you can avoid it too, without getting vaccinated, by following these simple guidelines, which will keep your immune system in optimal working order so that you're far less likely to acquire the infection to begin with.
- Optimize your vitmin D levels. As I've previously reported, optimizing your itamin D levels is one of the absolute best strategies for avoiding infections of ALL kinds, and vitamin D deficiencyis likely the TRUE culprit behind the seasonality of the flu -- not the flu virus itself.
- Avoid Sugar and Processed Foods. Sugar decreases the function of your immune system almost immediately, and as you likely know, a strong immune system is key to fighting off viruses and other illness. Be aware that sugar is present in foods you may not suspect, like ketchup and fruit juice.
- Get Enough Rest. Just like it becomes harder for you to get your daily tasks done if you're tired, if your body is overly fatigued it will be harder for it to fight the flu. Be sure to check out my article Guide to a Good Night's Sleep for some great tips to help you get quality rest.
- Have Effective Tools to Address Stress . We all face some stress every day, but if stress becomes overwhelming then your body will be less able to fight off the flu and other illness.
- Exercise. When you exercise, you increase your circulation and your blood flow throughout your body. The components of your immune system are also better circulated, which means your immune system has a better chance of finding an illness before it spreads. You can review my exercise guidelines for some great tips on how to get started.
- Take a good source of animal based omega-3 fats like Krill Oil. Increase your intake of healthy and essential fats like the omega-3 found in krill oil, which is crucial for maintaining health. It is also vitally important to avoid damaged omega-6 oils that are trans fats and in processed foods as it will seriously damage your immune response.
- Wash Your Hands. Washing your hands will decrease your likelihood of spreading a virus to your nose, mouth or other people. Be sure you don't use antibacterial soap for this -- antibacterial soaps are completely unnecessary, and they cause far more harm than good. Instead, identify a simple chemical-free soap that you can switch your family to.
- Eat Garlic Regularly. Garlic works like a broad-spectrum antibiotic against bacteria, virus, and protozoa in the body. And unlike with antibiotics, no resistance can be built up so it is an absolutely safe product to use. However, if you are allergic or don't enjoy garlic it would be best to avoid as it will likely cause more harm than good.
- Avoid Hospitals and Vaccines. In this particular case, I'd also recommend you stay away from hospitals unless you're having an emergency, as hospitals are prime breeding grounds for infections of all kinds, and could be one of the likeliest places you could be exposed to this new bug. Vaccines will not be available for six months at the minimum but when available they will be ineffective and can lead to crippling paralysis like Guillain-Barré Syndrome just as it did in the 70s.
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