Potential Swine Flu at Amherst College
According to an email from the University of Massachusetts Chancellor’s Office, Amherst may be the latest area hit by the H1N1 swine flu.
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health has identified two probable cases at Amherst College that have not yet been confirmed by the Center for Disease Control. Amherst College is taking precautions, including cancelling social gatherings and treating four other recent cases of flu as if they were also swine flu. Those students are being isolated, treated, and expected to make a full recovery.
“None of the students’ cases are considered serious and all are responding well to treatment,” said Amherst College president Anthony Marx. “The College is, however, taking a series of steps… to contain the virus and to protect our community.”
No cases have been reported at UMass so far, though they are preparing for potential illnesses. Anyone experiencing fever greater than 100 degrees F, sore throat, cough, stuffy nose, chills, headache, body aches and/or fatigue is asked to seek medical attention immediately.
Edit: For the lolz (thanks BoingBoing)
Written by Andrew
April 30th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Honestly, I wish the media wouldn’t blow diseases like this to such a massive scale. Considering the fact that at least thousands of people die each year of “run-of-the-mill” influenza and flu-like diseases, close to like thirty-thousand I believe. I mean, we have malaria, which kills/is killing thousands of times more people, and the thing the media is focusing on is a fucking fence-jumping, non-kosher, influenza virus. I could understand if it was H1N1 in 1918, since that killed a few million people. I guess any new disease is serious, but one that has been around for ages and shows no advancement over previous forms shouldn’t take THIS much hype.
PERSONALLY, I think you should contract the disease and rub yourself over as many people as possible. Maybe even sneeze in an aerosol can and spray it at people.
Kolkolgubgub
1 May 09 at 7:58 pm
Yeah, I think the media hype is overkill, but I just wanted to report it and be the first. I was beat by MassLive.com by like 10 minutes, but I beat the Boston Globe by about 12 hours. I guess they don’t give too much of a crap about western MA.
And yeah, there are several other, more pressing illnesses on a global scale, but I think the intrigue of this one is that because it’s new, we see it spreading and reaching new areas, and there’s the potential that we could catch it. Not many people in Amherst are going to catch malaria or TB this year. And keep in mind that while it is not such a horrible disease to us, the first reports of it were much more severe, and it does have potential to kill people with weakened immune systems.
Is it overblown? Yes. Do I think it should still be reported? Yes.
Andrew
1 May 09 at 8:04 pm
It drove down prices for pork though. That’s nice.
Wien
7 May 09 at 7:20 pm
What are you, a MOSLEM?
I can manage to buy entire legs of ham for about -50% price. It’s pretty swell that I can cheaply get a week’s worth of food so cheaply.
Kolkolgubgub
10 May 09 at 8:11 am
I’ve never been such a big pork guy, and I don’t really eat much meat in general these days. And actually, driving down the price of pork so much is generally a bad thing; farmers typically have it pretty rough in general, and knocking down prices so fast like this will just put the smaller, family farms out of business and, over time, just strengthen the larger producers.
Andrew
10 May 09 at 8:32 am
mmm true
but is this scare going to last long enough to have that effect?
Wien
10 May 09 at 9:34 pm