Swine Flu Freak Out

Are you a victim?

By Alaina Sheer

I have been hearing chatter about the Swine Flu online all week.

One amazing thing about not having a television (yes, I'm weird) is isolating yourself from sensational news stories. Not that the Swine Flu is merely a sensational news piece, I'm not trying to discount the victims or question the validity of the reports but I do think the television media has a way of making something seem much, much more frightening than it actually is.

When I finally asked someone at work what all of the Swine Flu fuss was about his eyes got really big and he said, "it's a pandemic. A real pandemic. People are dying all over the world."



"But I have to fly in a few weeks, with Benjamin, should I take him? Should I go?"

"Oh, I don't know. I'd be scared to fly. The victims are all young."

Fantastic. Could it really be that serious? Or is this another case of the media crying wolf and my unsuspecting countrymen blowing a story out of proportion? Either way I sat there and envisioned Benjamin and I flying out for our vacation to Vancouver only to return with a deathly illness.

Then I waited until this weekend when I sat down to read up on the Swine Flu.

Keep in mind, up until tonight, everything I knew about the Swine Flu had been gathered from word of mouth in my office or from my friends. With the exception of a few people who told me not to worry at all most of them were striking the fear of God in me about flying with a toddler.

So here's what I found out, courtesy of the New York Times:

In general, younger children are more vulnerable to infections, but children seem to be faring well in this particular outbreak. Healthy children older than 2 years of age should have no greater risk than adults while traveling. However, good hand hygiene is very important. Newborns and infants may be at greater risk, so the prudent measure would be to postpone nonessential travel for them.

And then I found this from CNN:

Even if there are swine-flu deaths outside Mexico -- and medical experts say there very well may be -- the virus would have a long way to go to match the roughly 36,000 deaths that seasonal influenza causes in the United States each year.

Both of these pieces were buried far from the headlines but I found them in a few seconds. Amazing isn't it? As mothers do you ever feel "used" by the mainstream media? And how many of you are actually paranoid about the Swine Flu?

I'm more fascinated about the spread of an irrational fear and news story than I am about the spread of a nasty flu virus - so I'll probably be taking a newspaper on the plane instead of a mask.