The World Health Organization recently warned that up to 2 billion could become infected with the swine flu if the recent outbreak becomes a pandemic and it could last as long as two years.
The WHO flu leader, Keiji Fukuda, said that when we look at the history of flu pandemics, it shows that approximately one-third, or 2 billion, of the world’s population will get infected. This said, he indicated that since the world has changed, looking at pandemics of earlier years is not an accurate predictor.
The professor of virology at St. Bart’s and Royal London Hospital, John Oxford, said people should not be scared, because this doesn’t mean 2 billion will die. WHO predicts that around 2 billion may contract it, but half won’t even show any symptoms, or if they do, they will be hardly noticeable.
Fukuda said that right now no one knows whether the recent strain will be severe or mild, but even with a mild flu, there will still be plenty of people who might develop pneumonia, need respirators, or die. One’s general health and other factors such as poor diet, war, HIV infections will cause people to be more vulnerable to the swine flu.
The swine flu virus has spread to 26 countries so far, Brazil and Argentina being the two most recent. WHO has raised its worldwide total of cases confirmed through labs to 2,099, from 1,893 on May 6.
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