Swine Flu; What Is It And When Did It Start?

H1N1 Virus, swine flu epidemic. You have heard about it on the news, read about it in the newspaper, and heard people talking about it at the coffee shop. But do you really know what it’s all about? What is swine flu epidemic, and when did it really start?

The H1N2 flu virus originated in an animal. This is called a “zoonotic” disease.

While your immune system might not immediately stop a new human influenza infection, it will recognize the new mutant and begin building a defense system. Avian and swine peplomers are not so easily recognized by the human system. As humans come in close contact with the animals that carry these viruses, the animal influenza mutates enough to cross the species bridge and infect humans as well.

Everyone thinks that Swine Flu started in late March of 2009. This new strain of virus was tracked back to a child from a small village in Mexico. The close proximity to hog farms led to an investigation that narrowed down to one particular farm. It was commonly thought at the time that this farm was the home for the first case of the flu among pigs.  Further investigation by the Mexican government proved this false and the virus was actually traced back to a farm in Texas. In end of March and early April of 2009, US cases had been recorded in Southern California and near San Antonio, Texas.

Before 2009 and the existence of swine flu as we know it, we can go back to the fall of 1988 where a previously healthy 32 year old woman visited her county fair swine exhibition. There was widespread influenza-like sickness among the swine at the exhibit. The pregnant woman was hospitalized with pneumonia, dying 8 days later. The H1N1 flu virus was positively detected.

Go back to 1976 and the story of four soldiers stationed at Fort Dix, New Jersey. Four soldiers in previously good health suddenly developed pneumonia. The virus was suspected of circulating in the close confines of the barracks during basic training and disappearing after claiming the life of one of the soldiers. The virus never travelled outside the initial group of soldiers.

The first swine flu virus in pigs was actually traced back to 1930 in the United States. Although the virus may have actually started at a pig farm, it mutated to a strain that humans caught and passed to other humans. Once a human catches the virus it is highly contagious and can be passed from person to person.

Although initially called the swine flu epidemic, it’s eerily comparable to the Spanish Influenza of 1918. The Spanish Flu began mildly, similar to the swine flu, but the second wave was deadly killing over 20 million people worldwide. On June 11, 2009, the World Health Organization declared the swine flu pandemic, and in doing so hoped to spur the government spending and swine flu vaccine production to combat the first global flu epidemic in 41 years. The WHO was quoted as stating the “spread of the H1N1 virus is considered unstoppable.”