Table of Contents
What is an Influenza Pandemic?
How should I prepare?
How can I protect myself?
What travel precautions are being taken?
Where can I learn more?
Glossary
About Influenza
Influenza (the “flu”) is a seasonal respiratory illness caused by flu viruses. The viruses can cause mild to severe illness sometimes resulting in death. It is important to note that the flu [...]

What is Swine Influenza? Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza virus. Swine influenza viruses may circulate among swine throughout the year, but most outbreaks occur during the late fall and winter months similar to outbreaks in humans.
Can humans catch swine flu? Swine flu viruses do not [...]

What is swine influenza?
Swine flu is a respiratory infection caused by influenza viruses that regularly cause outbreaks in pigs. There have been reports of serious illness and deaths due to swine flu in Mexico, but the recently confirmed cases in the United States have been mild.
What are the symptoms of swine influenza?
Swine flu symptoms appear [...]

Collection of specimens for pandemic influenza is slightly different from the usual collection procedures for seasonal influenza. Nasal washings are not an FDA approved specimen source for the pandemic influenza assay released by the CDC on May 1, 2009. Hopefully, this situation will change soon. We understand that many providers use nasal wash as a [...]

Influenza A H1N1 (swine flu) has spread around the world with what has, at times, felt like horrifying speed, but there is a feeling that many of us have dodged a bullet. Of the 2384 laboratory-confirmed cases reported in 24 countries, as TLID went to press, there had been 44 deaths, 42 of which were [...]

A Pandemic is an outbreak of disease which occurs simultaneously around the world. An influenza pandemic may occur from the 2009 H1N1 influenza (swine flu) currently circulating. Right now people could be at risk for developing the flu and there is no vaccine immediately available. Since the 2009 H1N1 flu virus is new to humans [...]

What is “Swine” flu? Swine Influenza (swine fl u) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza viruses that causes regular outbreaks in pigs. People do not normally get swine flu, but human infections can and do happen. Swine fl u viruses have been reported to spread from person-to-person, but in the [...]

The National Influenza Immunization Program, the official title for this venture, was unprecedented in intended timing and in scope among American immunization efforts . It aimed at inoculating everyone before becember 1976 against a new flu strain that might conceivably become as big a killer as the flu of 1918, the worst ever . The [...]

Like all influenza viruses, swine flu viruses change constantly. Pigs can be infected by bird and human influenza viruses as well as swine influenza viruses. When influenza viruses from different species infect pigs, the viruses can reassort (that is, swap genes) and new viruses can emerge.
That is what has happened with the recent cases of [...]

Most genetic changes in the flu viruses human, pig, and bird are small and subtle point mutations in the virus’s RNA. Less common but more alarming are sudden, wholesale changes that replace entire genes and are more likely to circumvent the immune system. This process, called genetic shift, is exactly what is now occurring in [...]

Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza viruses. Outbreaks of swine flu happen regularly in pigs. People do not normally get swine flu, but human infections can and do happen. Most commonly, human cases of swine flu happen in people who are around pigs but it’s possible [...]

The Swine Flu Information Line was set up to provide immediate and accurate information to residents with questions or concerns about the disease,” said Health Director Chiyome Fukino, M.D. “With recent worldwide events, our department has received increasing requests for general information on swine influenza, and people need to know what they can do to [...]