Swine Flu
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LearningTranscript
00:00Hey, Moby, want some breakfast?
00:07Huh.
00:08All right, all right, here you go.
00:14Moby?
00:16What's wrong?
00:20Dear Tim and Moby, can you tell me about swine flu?
00:25From Kathleen.
00:27Oh.
00:29In 2009, there was a swine flu outbreak.
00:32That's when a disease spread suddenly across a population.
00:36But guess what?
00:38No one got it from eating bacon.
00:40Or any other properly cooked pork product, for that matter.
00:44Plus, swine flu is much rarer now than it was back in 2009.
00:49So you can, um, come out now.
00:54Like other types of flu, this one is caused by the influenza virus.
00:58There are many strains or versions of influenza virus, each slightly different than the others.
01:04Some of them make humans sick, giving us the combination of fever, coughing, body aches, upset stomach, vomiting, and diarrhea that we call the flu.
01:14Some strains affect mostly birds, giving them avian flu.
01:19And swine flu comes from strains that usually only infect pigs.
01:24But occasionally, flu viruses that are normally associated with animals can change, or mutate, into new strains that can infect humans, too.
01:34Health officials believe that what we know as swine flu is actually a combination of four different flu viruses.
01:40Two swine, one avian, and one human.
01:44That's why it's not even called swine flu anymore.
01:47Instead, scientists refer to the virus as Novel H1N1, or 2009 H1N1.
01:56Well, once the virus mutated, it's possible that it spread from infected pigs to farmers who had direct contact with them.
02:04Eventually, the virus began passing from one human to another.
02:08The virus originated in Mexico, where the first cases were reported.
02:13It quickly spread through North America and onto countries around the world.
02:18Right, H1N1 spreads just like any other flu.
02:22When an infected person sneezes or coughs, they release virus-filled droplets into the air that can easily find their way into other people's bodies.
02:32Well, normally the flu just makes you sick for a week or so, and then you get better.
02:37But in rare cases, and especially with new virus strains, the flu can be dangerous or even deadly.
02:44For one thing, our immune systems need time to develop new defenses against new strains.
02:50So, even healthy people can become really sick if they get infected because their bodies don't know how to fight the virus off.
02:58But also, when a new flu strain arrives on the scene, like H1N1 did, scientists need time to develop a treatment that'll work against it.
03:08Actually, no.
03:10If you get a flu shot before an outbreak of a new strain of flu, it won't help, because you're shot only protected for older strains.
03:18Without proper defenses, a new virus can quickly multiply, invade other tissues and organs, and spread from person to person.
03:27This can lead to an epidemic, a major outbreak of a disease in one region or country.
03:33In more serious situations, it can lead to a pandemic, a worldwide outbreak that can affect millions of people.
03:40The swine flu outbreak spread far enough in just a few months to be declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization.
03:50No, you definitely shouldn't panic.
03:53The World Health Organization declared the swine flu pandemic officially over back in 2010.
04:00And scientists have created a vaccine that can prevent people from getting it in the first place.
04:10You... you swine!