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Why didn't swine flu come back this year?

(7 posts)

  1. WOW!
    Member

    It first started in April of 2009, but it didn't come back this April, and now it's June. I haven't heard anything about it at all.

    Posted 1 year ago #

  2. Bitsy
    Member

    they had vaccines and medicines to kill it off.
    :)

    Posted 1 year ago #

  3. Olivia S
    Member

    Once you've had the swine flu you can't get it again and since there was already a huge initial outbreak we will hear less and less about it.

    The bad thing about flus and other viruses is that they can mutate causing us to be able to catch another strand of it.. this is why every year you can catch the flu.

    Posted 1 year ago #

  4. MaiRose
    Member

    It's not that it didn't come back, it didn't go away, just the media hype went away. I think in most cases they've stopped testing for whether it's flu (whatever strain) vs. H1N1 flu because they are using the same treatment regardless - Tamaflu. This is what I've heard in the hospital I'm at. Also, the vaccines came out (and many folks got 1 shot but not the follow-up a month later) which may have helped decrease the spread and the fear some. Also, after that cheerleader hoax on YouTube about side effects from a flu shot - said she got tardive dyskinsia, or involuntary muscle movements - people got scared.

    Posted 1 year ago #

  5. Flashflood
    Member

    Probably natural progression and immunity. The vaccine didn't have anything to do with it, that's for sure. The number of people getting vaccine was dismally low - mostly because people didn't fall for the hype.
    Also, I have been keeping a close eye on the statistics where I live and the number of H1N1 cases (and flu cases in general as well as hospital visits for flu'like illnesses) had already sharply declined and was continuing to fall before the vaccine was even made available to public high risk groups and then to the general public. Considering that the vaccine then takes approximately 10 - 14 days to offer any 'protection' the number of H1N1 cases were STILL continuing to drop at a rapid pace during that time. IF the vaccine had actually had any impact, the numbers would have shown an even steeper drop after that. They did not. It kept on its same bell curve path.

    IMO...because H1N1 was mostly hitting younger individuals but older people didn't seem to be at as much risk....I believe that H1N1 was NOT actually new but really was a re-occurance of something that had been around before - which might explain why older individuals rarely got it (already immune?)

    There wasn't the usual second increase in ANY flu this year (usually it comes in two waves during the flu season) either. Why was that? Maybe it was because of all the disease prevention information that was put out...like handwashing, sneezing or coughing into your sleeve rather than your hands or the air....etc. The public was saturated with this basic disease prevention information... these kinds of activities are the number one way to reduce illness. Or maybe, exposure to H1N1 offers some protection (remember that the percentage of the population never even got the vaccine...and two vaccines were only recommended for children under a certain age).
    I'm not sure. I'd have to check with the Epidemiologist I work with to see if there has been any other times where that second wave didn't occur.

    Edit: @ Weise. I have the statistics right in front of me. What do you have? Even the CDC has not yet had the nerve to try and make the claim you are making.

    Posted 1 year ago #

  6. Weise Ente
    Member

    Too few susceptible individuals in the population to sustain it. Enough people were vaccinated or had it last year that it simply couldn't infect enough people. This always happens, which is why a different strain of influenza predominates every year.

    Ignore the ignorant nurse. The data do show the vaccine worked.

    Posted 1 year ago #

  7. paul
    Member

    The media first noticed it in April 2009, but it was around before that. The CDC thinks it was circulating since 2008 unnoticed. My wife had the worst flu of her life in February 2009 and I caught it from her (but got a milder version). Everyone was sick at that time. Doctor says it is likely it was H1N1 because we never caught the flu after that even though H1N1 kept going around the community. We probably already had it before the media noticed it.

    Posted 1 year ago #

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