H1N1: Pandemic was emotional as well as physical
Rosemary Stephen’s Recommended read: Park M. H1N1: Pandemic was emotional as well as physical (2010) H1N1: Fighting the Flue, CNN Health. (On-line) Available: http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/23/h1n1.flu/. Cited 2010 Feb 24
Now that the current threat of H1N1 has subsided (at least in the public’s mind), it is interesting to look back at how people reacted to the pandemic. Madison Park, in an on-line article entitled H1N1: Pandemic was emotional as well as physical, presents stories from health professionals and from ordinary people on how the pandemic personally affected their lives, as well as looking at the current criticisms that the pandemic was overinflated. The article is nonjudgmental, instead it simply presents what was important to individuals when faced with the threat of H1N1.
There are also three links in the text, one to a medical blog by Dr. Sanjay Gupta and two to personal video commentaries. Dr. Gupta explains how the World Health Organization works with pharmaceutical companies to prepare the annual flu vaccines and why the H1N1 virus was not included in this process. The two video commentaries are by individuals on two ends of the scale; one individual who was not concerned about the H1N1 virus per se, but instead treated it like standard seasonal flu and one individual with deep concerns about the H1N1 virus because his wife has an autoimmune disorder. These links are very interesting and add the our understanding of how the pandemic impacted the lives of individuals.
I highly recommend reading this article because this pattern repeats itself whenever we are confronted with a new and unexpected disease.
Rosemary Stephen PMed, (cert) EOH, IPM
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