Strange Killer Swine Flu Outbreak in Mexico

[Teaos]

So first official pandemic in 40 years and I'm in one of the hot spots.

[Tsukiyumi]

So first official pandemic in 40 years and I'm in one of the hot spots.

Ain't it great? It's like we're part of history. I'm excited.

And, by excited, I mean not happy at all.

[Teaos]

I know it is a lot of hype, but it is still weird. SARS and Bird flu were just like this but ammounted to nothing, but this one really is spreading.

Oh well, the death rate is still piss all, shame for those who do get it, especially if they are already sick, but I'm personally not to worried, it certainly wont be another 1919.

[Tsukiyumi]

I'm not worried at all, personally. My immune system is bad ass.

I'm just pissed that it's been allowed to spread this far at all.

[Teaos]

Its flu, not an easy thing to stop.

[Tyyr]

It's the modern world. You can't stop a disease from spreading, not when someone can travel from one side of the world to the other in a day or so.

Well you can, but not everyone wants to run their country like Madagascar.

[Tsukiyumi]

What, in this modern world there are no vaccines for stuff like this?

[Teaos]

Not a brand new one, vaccines take type to design and grow, each vaccine comes from a chicken egg.

There is tamiflu which dies help a very little bit. But a taylor made vaccine for this takes time to make. Hell they still dont have one and believe me, they have been working on it 24/7 since they found out about it.

[Tyyr]

Vaccines are not going to contain something like this. Not unless you can find a way to give them to every single person in every major country on the planet. It takes time to develop, manufacture, and distribute a vaccine and here's the real kicker, it's not guaranteed to be effective. Every year there are dozens of strains of the flu that could potentially infect people and be a serious problem, the resources exist to deal with just one. Sometimes they pick right, sometimes they don't. At this point I wouldn't be shocked to find out there are multiple strains of "swine flu" further complicating things.

All it takes is one person on a plane to infect dozens of others going to different cities and countries. They infect more, and they infect more. By the time the first person even begins to develop symptoms hundreds or even thousands can be infected. The mobility of the modern age makes combating something like this almost impossible.

[Tsukiyumi]

I'll admit that the various fields of medicine aren't my strong suit, but one would think that we'd be able to do a bit better if we really wanted to.

[Teaos]

I read once you are looking at 6 months at a minimum just due to the process involved, and thats if you know what your doing.

This is new and requires reserch time on top of that.

[Tsukiyumi]

I read once you are looking at 6 months at a minimum just due to the process involved, and thats if you know what your doing.

This is new and requires reserch time on top of that.

Like I said, you'd think we could do better than that.

[Teaos]

Why? We've been fucking around with the human body for ages and we still can't make a replacement heart... or any organ for that matter.

[Tyyr]

Given what's involved that's a pretty damn fast turn around. You're isolating a new virus, researching a vaccine, testing to make sure it actually works, then you have to manufacture millions of doses of the vaccine and distribute them. 6 Months isn't a lot of wasted time, it's busting ass.

[Mikey]

What, in this modern world there are no vaccines for stuff like this?

Influenza is strangely adaptable. It's not a case of a vaccine for a different strain having diminshed potency; it's a case of a vaccine for a different strain being entirely worthless.

Anyway, the short answer is - there is... now. A Swiss firm announced this morning that they had developed an N1H1 vaccine, about two weeks ahead of schedule. Don't have details on production or distribution times, though.