The swine flu has not been declared a pandemic, but the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control are closely monitoring the situation. One death of a very young child in Texas has been reported. However, it appears that child contracted the virus in Mexico, and had some unidentified underlying health issues, which may have made him more susceptible to severe illness from this strain.
What is the Swine Flu?
This strain of Swine Flu is a new strain of swine flu and contains gene segments that have previously not been identified in either swine or human influenza viruses. Swine flu is a respiratory infection and caused by an Influenza A (H1N1) swine virus. However, it is genetically different from known human H1N1 virus. This particular swine flu strain contains genetic material from four viruses: North American swine influenza, avian Influenza, human influenza and swine Influenza of a Eurasian strain.
Previously, swine flu has been known to spread from pigs to humans; however, in the cases investigated to date in the United States there has been no contact with pigs, and the CDC has determined that these cases have spread from human-to-human transmission.
To date there has been one reported death in the United States; type-matching has confirmed the strain of swine flu in US cases matches the strain identified in Mexico, where 150+ people have died. In the Mexico cases, the majority of deaths have occurred among those aged 20-50. Twenty plus of these deaths have been confirmed as related to swine flu, and the rest are suspected swine flu deaths, but still undergoing testing to confirm. It is unknown why the cases in Mexico have been more severe than what has been seen here so far, but the CDC and the World Health Organization have deployed resources to Mexico to further investigate cases there.