A Funny Season

The swine flu appears to be turning into a major epidemic.

Virulent swine flu spread to 10 U.S. states from coast to coast Wednesday and swept deeper into Europe, extending its global reach as President Barack Obama mourned the first U.S. death, a Mexican toddler who had traveled with his family to Texas. Total American cases surged to nearly 100, and Obama said wider school closings might be necessary.

The World Health Organization said the outbreak is moving closer to becoming a full-scale pandemic.

Dr. Keiji Fukuda, the organization's top flu expert, told reporters in Geneva that the latest developments are moving the agency closer to raising its pandemic alert to phase 5, indicating widespread human-to-human transmission. That's just one step below level 6, a full-fledged pandemic.

That is worrying. Another thing that is worrying is the fact that this outbreak has taken place so late in the flu season.

Flu season starts to peak in November and continues to peak through April.

Obviously the flu is mainly a cold weather phenomenon. Now I was under the impression that Global Warming was going to cause wide spread disease. It appears that global cooling can have the same effect.

In any case the late start of this flu should help as the weather warms up. Maybe. We can only hope it doesn't turn out like the Pandemic Flu in America 1918-1920.