Swine Flu - Definition and Introduction
Swine flu is a flu that
became known in 2009 with the name of type A H1N1 influenza which is a human
disease. People who get this disease are infected by other people, not from
pigs.
The disease was
initially dubbed swine flu because the virus that caused the disease initially
jumped to humans from live pigs where the virus did develop in the pig's body.
This virus is a mixture of flu virus genes from pigs, birds, and human flu
viruses.
The swine flu virus
that usually spreads between pigs is not the same as a human flu virus. Swine
flu rarely infects humans. Infection can occur immediately if humans have
direct contact with pigs.
However, the current
outbreak of swine flu is indeed different from the flu from pigs that were
transmitted to humans before. The current swine flu virus makes it possible to
spread from person to person who has never made contact with pigs.
To distinguish
influenza viruses that infect humans, the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention calls swine flu with the 2009 H1N1 virus. Other names include: H1N1
Novel, quadruple assortant H1N1 and H1N1 pandemic 2009
Many people have at
least partial immunity to the H1N1 virus because they have been infected or
vaccinated against this flu. This virus changes genetically, so this is the
reason why flu vaccines must be given from time to time.
H1N1 swine flu is not
an ordinary variant of H1N1. This virus comes to humans from different
evolutionary lines. That means most people do not have natural immunity for
H1N1 swine flu. Vaccinating seasonal flu does not protect the body against this
new virus.
Some people who may
have seasonal H1N1 flu before 1957 may have a little protective immunity
against this new virus. That's because seasonal H1N1 flu strains circulating
before 1957 are genetically more similar to the 2009 H1N1 swine flu.
Protection from 1957
H1N1 flu is also not complete protection. However, relatively few elderly
people experienced H1N1 swine flu, and despite being affected by many of those
who did not experience severe illness.
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