What flu?

Or: Which flu?

I sometimes am reluctant to over-cite Wikipedia, due to it's "amateur/enthusiast" contributors, although the only clearly biased entries, let alone inaccurate ones, I've seen were for relatively obscure political figures. However.

I decided to see what Wikipedia has to say about H1N1 Influenza.

Influenza A virus subtype H1N1, also known as A(H1N1), is a subtype of influenzavirus A and the most common cause of influenza (flu) in humans. Some strains of H1N1 are endemic in humans, including the strain(s) responsible for the 1918 flu pandemic which killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Less virulent H1N1 strains still exist in the wild today, worldwide, causing a small fraction of all influenza-like illness and a large fraction of all seasonal influenza. H1N1 strains caused roughly half of all flu infections in 2006.[1] Other strains of H1N1 are endemic in pigs and in birds.

In March and April 2009, hundreds of laboratory-confirmed infections and a number of deaths were caused by an outbreak of a new strain of H1N1.[2]

It goes on to say

2009 swine flu outbreak

The swine influenza virus isolated from patients in the United States was found to be made up of genetic elements from four different flu viruses – North American Mexican influenza, North American avian influenza, human influenza, and swine influenza virus typically found in Asia and Europe – "an unusually mongrelised mix of genetic sequences."[12] This new strain appears to be a result of reassortment of human influenza and swine influenza viruses, in all four different strains of subtype H1N1. However, as the virus has not yet been isolated in animals to date and also for historical naming reasons, the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) suggests it be called "North-American influenza".[13] On April 30, 2009 the World Health Organization began referring to the outbreak as "Influenza A (H1N1)" instead of "swine flu"[14], presumably to countermand the consequences of the misleading less scientifically labeled name as referenced by WHO spokesperson Dick Thompson.[15]

.... The six genes from American swine flu are themselves mixtures of swine flu, bird flu, and human flu viruses.[18][19] While viruses with this genetic makeup had not previously been found to be circulating in humans or pigs, there is no formal national surveillance system to determine what viruses are circulating in pigs in the U.S.[20]

Here's the link to their main article on the 2009 "Swine" Flu outbreak.

The 2009 flu outbreak, commonly called the swine flu, is a spread of a new strain of influenza virus that was clinically identified in April 2009.[55] The new virus strain is a type of influenza A (H1N1) virus.[56] The outbreak has also been called the H1N1 influenza,[57] 2009 H1N1 flu,[58][59] Mexican flu,[60] or swine-origin influenza.[61] It is currently a level 5 outbreak, one level below an official pandemic.

Although the exact time and location of the outbreak is unknown, it is believed to have been first detected when an influenza-like illness was reported by both health agencies and local news media in Mexico. The virus responsible was clinically identified as a new strain on April 24, 2009. Within days, isolated cases (and suspected cases) were identified elsewhere in Mexico, the U.S., and several other countries.

By April 28, the new strain was confirmed to have spread to Spain, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Israel, and the virus was suspected in many other nations, with a total of over 4,400 candidate cases, prompting the World Health Organization (WHO) to change its pandemic alert phase to "Phase 5",[62][63][64] which is defined as "...human-to-human spread of the virus into at least two countries in one WHO region. While most countries will not be affected at this stage, the declaration of Phase 5 is a strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time to finalize the organization, communication, and implementation of the planned mitigation measures is short".[65] Despite the scale of the alert, WHO officials noted on April 29 that the majority of people infected with the virus have made a full recovery without need of medical attention or antiviral drugs.

Part of the reason I made this post was that there are so many people repeating that "it's just the flu!", possibly because the H1N1 flu is, in fact very common. However, if you read this far you probably at least skimmed the paragraphs I linked to, so are now aware (if you weren't before) that this is not "just the flu."

Yeah, it might turn out to not be that big a deal. And it might even be that it would never have been a big deal, even if we never took any precautions.

Can we afford to take that chance?

(FWIW, I note that one of the 7 or more cases in King County WA was at an elementary school about a mile from Schloss Drang...)