1st new-flu infection of pigs suspected in Japan

Wednesday 21st October, 03:56 AM JST

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11 Comments

franz75 at 08:53 AM JST - 21st October

We should stop producing pigs, cutting the link between the chicken and human. Pig farms are bad for the environment and pork meat is bad for your health anyways.
KallyPygous at 09:03 AM JST - 21st October

Pigs catching flu is nothing special. They have their own strains of flu that circulate every year, just the same as humans do. Really scraping the bottom of the barrel for news here.
eigonosensei at 11:04 AM JST - 21st October

"Confirmation of whether the animal is infected with the new strain of influenza.....is pending at the National Institute of Animal Health in Tsukuba...."

News media giving us another "maybe nothing to be concerned with" story. Maybe wait for the confirmation of whether it is or isn't the new flu strain? Now, THAT would be news.
Yelnats at 12:45 PM JST - 21st October

If the pigs would stop going around and hanging out in Izakaya with their pig buddies, and washed their cute little hoofs all the time, we would not have this problem. My question though is this, do pigs with asthma get priority for a swine flu vaccination? Will they make a vaccination for the pigs?
stirfry at 04:39 PM JST - 21st October

a pig getting swine flu ? who woulda thought ?
Thmegu at 08:23 PM JST - 21st October

How are pigs a link between chicken and human???
nandakandamanda at 08:58 PM JST - 21st October

Domestic pigs can be dirty or clean, depending on how humans look after them. Chickens can be dirty or clean, depending on the culture. Humans can be dirty or clean, depending on how they look after themselves. Not sure if you can state absolutely that one animal is innately 'dirtier' than another. A religious judgment, perhaps?

Pigs and humans are said to be biologically similar. You can't force pigs to wear face masks, though. (Could you design masks for pigs?)
cow76 at 09:48 PM JST - 21st October

Thmegu, Franz75 is correct. Pigs can get diseases from birds which then mutate with diseases pigs have caught from humans. These can then be passed on in either direction. I'm not sure if there are any diseases that can spread directly from bird to human (or vice versa) but I suspect not.
nandakandamanda at 12:49 AM JST - 22nd October

Franz75 and cow76, I believe you are talking about avian (bird) influenza which starts with ducks in south China, and gravitates through pigs to humans. Avian influenza also gets from chickens into humans, but this is not directly related to pigs.

The article above, however, is talking about "new-flu" (shin-gata) influenza, which is what the Japanese call it instead of the Western expression "swine influenza".
Yelnats at 12:02 PM JST - 22nd October

Shin Gata Influenza. Never heard it that way before. When my doc gave me the vaccine for Flu A yesterday, he understood the term swine flu perfectly well.
nandakandamanda at 12:26 PM JST - 22nd October

They have made a conscious choice in Japan not to use the term "swine flu", (probably don't want emotions to affect pork sales) although they understand that many countries use it. Everyone knows "Shingata".