I was browsing The Star just now while enjoying my char-siu, siu yuk fun and I saw this news that totally caught my attention.

So, tell me, the third death was on 4.40am today(28th July 2009, Tuesday morning) or last Tuesday 4.40pm(21st July 2009) or is The Star predicting future now?

TheStar.com.my have also included the FAQs on this virus.

As many of you may already know that currently there’s a Swine Flu(H1N1 virus, hog flu, pig flu) outbreak. World Health Organization(WHO) have recently notched up the alert system Phase 5, the second highest level. I was told that if it’s the highest level, a curfew may/will be imposed to avoid any further infectious of the virus( which means most of of the people need not go to office and work, but there is such thing called working from home nowadays where you connect to office’s network remotely).

As of this moment, Mexican President Felipe Calderon told his people to stay home from Friday for a five-day partial shutdown of the economy, after the World Health Organisation said a swine flu pandemic was imminent. Swine Flu have killed 176 people in Mexico, and the first Swine Flu death of a 23 months old Mexico Child at Texas. There is also cases reported in United States, Neitherlands and Switzerland.

*NOTE : Image taken from MSNBC as of this moment and may not be updated at my blog. Please view their site for the latest updates.

*NOTE : Images taken from Wikipedia. Please click here as the map can be edited very rapidly because it is a current event which is changing hour by hour.

The swine flu have made the global wide very much worrying as there is no common traid as it may infect anyone no matter the person is rich, poor, young, old, and even healthy people and it is spreading fast, not to mention, killing fast too and it may mutate its form. Roberto Mendozaaged, 29, who was a wrestler, ate heartily, pumped iron at the gym and loved football. Then he caught a vicious strain of flu, checked into hospital and nine days later he was dead. That was so unbeliveable! Why does it even affect healthy people like him?

So, now you know how severe it is. But, what are the symptoms?

It is quite hard to identify it as it is almost identical to the regular flu symtoms. It is air-borne and spreads through tiny particles in the air when the infected person sneezes or cough.

*NOTE : Image taken from MSNBC, please click here for more information.

The symtoms are:-
- chills
- fever
- sore throat
- muscle pains
- severe headache
- coughing
- weakness and general discomfort (body ache, some people reported vomitting as well)

In this video, Dr. Joe Bresee, with CDC’s Influenza Division, describes the symptoms of swine flu and warning signs to look for that indicate the need for urgent medical attention.

There have been so many types of severe infectious flu such as since centuries ago. Currently the worrying one is the Swine Flu. But before this, we have Hong Kong Flu (1968-1969), Fujian flu (2003–2004), Avian Flu and etc… which was caused by H1N1, H1N2, H3N1,H3N2, and H2N3.

The various types of influenza viruses in humans. Solid squares show the appearance of a new strain, causing recurring influenza pandemics. Broken lines indicate uncertain strain identifications.

Erm..dun ask me about this..I’m so confused with all the H and N terms. View here for more information from Wikipedia.

I should stop this Swine Flu blog post as of this moment, I’m starting to feel the runny nose, and sore throat myself. Oh no, is it spreading remotely from the infected person to the internet to my laptop to me now? Nah..couldn’t be right? That’s impossible.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh CHU!