Last week, the biggest news that was on everyone's mind was the outbreak of a new type of influenza, the Swine Flu, now called more formally the H1N1 Virus. This virus was traced back to Mexico, which had a fairly serious outbreak, and led to the effective shutdown of Mexico City.
Some of the last major news about this virus was the World Health Organization increased the pandemic alert level to 5, which was an indication that a pandemic was imminent.
We also learned about the spread of the virus to individuals in numerous countries worldwide, but while it seemed to cover a wide geographic spread, that didn't mean that too many people were infected. Most of the news after that was positive, especially the news that Mexico City started to come back to life. It seemed to me as if some people felt like pandemic had fizzled out.
But I can assure you that this pandemic has not gone anywhere and actually looks quite like the real thing.
I compiled the data released by the CDC every day from April 23 until now regarding the number of confirmed cases of Swine Flu in America. And, well, let's just say the graph explains it best:
Yep, it's hit a huge growth spurt now, since infections tend to spread exponentially. In the last three days, the infection count went from 642 up to 1639. And it's in nearly every state at this point.
And the potentially scary part about this is that this is reaching the stage where infection is going to become widespread, just as Americans are already wondering aloud about the media's coverage of the illness as if the epidemic was long over.
I just wanted to remind you all that it hasn't, and that if you were taking precautions to try and stop the spread of infection, continue them.
And of course, remember to wash your hands frequently, stay out of work and public places if you're showing any symptoms of being ill, and cover your mouth when coughing.
It never hurts to exercise an abundance of caution, especially at times like this.