A Superstructers view of H1N1

First off, its not really "swine" flu, so far no known recent swine cases. Its a novel version of H1N1 which was a very virulent strain of flu that affected mostly my grandparents generation around 1918. Although there will be many problems found in the industrial swine industry similar to recent discoveries of rampant filth in the peanut and pistachio industries, H1N1 has more to do with our ability to meet the basic hygiene needs of the worlds population, to provide a hand washing place as well as a point of waste elimination and site of clean water for drinking. This basic water services and systems hygiene must be matched with information services, we have the technology and capacity as a population to provide a lot more feedback in the form of raw information into our systems; texting makes it easy and ubiquitous.

Our weaknesses will be revealed in sharp relief. It may be starting to dawn on some people why we want every person in our state here in California to feel very comfortable seeking medical care. CDC has lots of up to date information, some of which is below:

What You Can Do to Stay Healthy

There are everyday actions people can take to stay healthy.

* Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
* Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hands cleaners are also effective.
* Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread that way.

Try to avoid close contact with sick people.

* Influenza is thought to spread mainly person-to-person through coughing or sneezing of infected people.
* If you get sick, CDC recommends that you stay home from work or school and limit contact with others to keep from infecting them.
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How fast can we get this information out? People also do not seem readily aware of the difference between one type of flu virus and another. Gaps in our educational process also shine through when you realize most people really aren't very aware of the H1N1 influenza epidemic that hit the early twentieth century quite hard.

Also how fast can we teach people to get their part of the needed information in? Its possible to use the power of texting and the ubiquitous nature of cell phones to create a steady stream of relevant incoming information about H1N1 and also to use these devices to check in with contagious conditions in a remote and contained manner.

We need to use a robust and transparent set of information to build a large scale mosaic of what is happening that is more accurate than the goggle maps h1n1 information, more selective than simply searching twitter for #H1N1.

At some level I hope that there is a cohesive understanding of what channels of physical travel have been used to carry ill people, with the existing information stream it must be possible to reconstruct flights and passenger lists and to actually reach out and contact people to see if they have in turn become ill. Also its not certain whether the cases are directly related as reported or merely variants of the version of H1N1 that are in DF in Mexico.

This interesting industry ProMed mail report suggests that initial apathy towards a serious influenza following a pattern of the 1918 virus would re-emerge as a dangerously out of control pandemic months later; the 1918 outbreak emerged in May and really was something in everyones daily lives in more like August. Of course we hope that due to modern circumstances we might be able to better inform and contain, in fact we must make it so. History is a good starting point to look at to find important patterns to consider when considering a series of informed future forecasts.