The Journey of Mine

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Must admit, I'm a little bit ashamed by the fact, that as a biological sciences student, it's only when my parents told me not to eat pork did I knew the occurance of swine flu.

It was fast spreaded. Only a few days later, my beloved Britain announced two confirmed H1N1 positive cases. Meanwhile, the infection wave also hit Spain, France, Germany, Neatherland, ...finally Sweden.

I remeber vividly, that Chinese scientists were the first who claim that had already invented sensitive and fast H1N1 test kit. It was amusing since by then China does not have any confirmed H1N1 positive case. So how can they test the sensitivity of their kit? By testing pig's blood? Oh wait, they wouldn't have one, would they? After all human can be infected by H1N1 if there is any contact with sick pigs. If China had H1N1 infected pigs, it would have loads of H1N1 infected human by now.

But how did it all start? It was previously stated that the genetics of H1N1 virus was a combination of pig, human and avian influenza strains. But now many scientists argue that evidence shows it is more likely to be a hybrid of two common pig flu strains. Those two strains were never been observed circulating among humans. Therefore, human immunity against H1N1 is relatively low, which gives a reason why H1N1 is now rapidly spreaded among humans.

The first recorded case of H1N1 human infection traces back to a boy who lives near a large unsanitary hog farm. Were the viruses he get from sick pigs? There are scientific evidences state that unsanitary conditions at industrial hog farms could prove a breeding ground for new forms of influenza. Of course, the company who owns this notoriously farm denies it. I can't help but remeber the campaign Jamie Oliver engaged, in which he called on the public to act against low pig welfare in the industrial hog farms. Seriously, people, not only pigs, but also those farms which breed chicken, lamb, goose. It's not about the taste of meat animal, like normal people as you and me will notice the difference; it's about protecting us from deadly virus.

Flu pandemics historically come in waves. It often gets worse as they go. BBC news tells me now all the cases in outside mexico only present wild syptoms. From my experience, the whole Europe act like they don't care about the flu, since all EU citizens can go in and out of their country freely, as long as they're vising EU countries. Even after evidence of flu spread from human to human was shown.

But they are probably right. Now it is only the wild wave. In 1918, the last H1N1 pandemic came back with a deadly second wave. Statistically, it shows human immunity gave those who were infected during the wild first wave 70% protection. (God knows what this means. What's 70% protection?) So just maybe, let the universe do what it should be doing and let's all get infected. It will give us 70% protection if there is a deadly second wave.

On the other hand, the Asian world decide they should not let this mild flu enter their border. I'm amazed at the ridiculous amount of email I received from NTU warning me about H1N1. Whereas I haven't received any email from Linkoping University when there is a confirmed H1N1 case in Stockholm. After all, in the most relaxing place in the world, the Sweds are having fun partying. What do they care? Even now I can hear some drunk dudes flirting with a girl who is currently crying and shouting something just outside my window.

Not wanting to repeat the history of 1918 H1N1 pandemic, the scientists say we should be prepared for the possibility of a deadly second wave. Their best shot is to develope vaccines as soon as possible. Even in best case scenario, they cannot produce enough vaccines for the world's population. What's the result then? the vaccines might probably not work for the mutated virus in the deadly second wave. Even if it will work, since not enough vaccines will be in the market, they are gonna be ridiculously costly.

So what now? Do we limit travel and crowd to keep the virus away? Or do we do as what we usually do and may get infected thus increasing our chance of survival when the second deadly wave (it there is) hit us? I honestly can't make a choice, but personally prefer the later one. The reason is not quite sensible: Nothing can stop me from visiting Britain.