Swine Flu Parties
 

Hmmm I may be the last one to hear about this, but I found it interesting (bizarre actually). Extremely gross.

http://www.wdbj7.com/global/story.asp?s=11364458

I think my kid's high school inadvertantly hosted their version otherwise known as Homecoming Dance last Saturday. Lots of kids mingled in the gym for hours and now everyone we know is home with a flu of some sort. :mad: One kid who goes to a private practice has a confirmed H1N1 case/gave him Tamaflu, but the military hospital that most of us use isn't even running tests or giving any meds.

This is horrible timing as next Friday is the end of the term so next week is full of scheduled exams in every subject.

That's awful. I don't think schools around here are doing any better. smh

I did chuckle at the part in bold.

hell. no.

These parents are idiots. They're probably the same ones who refuse to vaccinate their children from anything, and then wonder why their infant is on life support after contracting pertussis.

IDIOTS.

Our school had their homecoming dance Saturday also although it's my son, who wasn't there, who is home sick with the flu. The pediatrician said that he was testing everybody with flu symptoms until about a week ago. He stopped testing because 98% of them were coming back positive. He said there's nothing else going around. Thankfully, he's been our pediatrician since my oldest was born so he gave me a script for Tami flu for my daughter "when she gets it", not IF she gets it, but when. He's just assuming all the kids will.

Glad I'm not the only one who feels this way.

I won't go/send my (hypothetical, since I am an unmarried 20 year old :p) children to a swine flu party, but I really do think the whole swine flu paranoia is drastically overblown. If you don't have an underlying condition, the swine flu is no more or less harmful on average then the regular flu (which, FYI, kills over 250,000 people worldwide every year).

The reason there was such concern initially is because it was at that point unknown what strain of H1N1 this flu was; another type of H1N1 is the Spanish Flu which once killed 50 million people in 2 years ... which is obviously much more serious. However, now that it's known to be the far less threatening swine flu variant of H1N1, the mass hysteria is totally unnecessary. Yes, take the same precautions you'd take for the flu; if you get/are in the target group for the regular flu shot, get the swine flu shot as well. I got them both, as I have asthma and when I get sick, I get real good and sick and end up in the ER.

Parents did this for years with the chicken pox, before the vaccine was available ... way better then having it as an adult! :)

They had a story on NBC tonight where they were, in effect, castigating university students for not being psychotically worried over the flu and going on with their normal lives. One of the girls was like "I got it, it was over in 3 days, I'm fine."

I saw that NBC news program, too. I thought the college kids sounded like they were being a lot more reasonable about it. If you get it, you stay in your dorm room and watch movies and eat ramen noodles for a couple days. It's not like the end of the world unless you recently had an organ transplant or something!

Now parents making there kids sick is a different story... just silly, if you ask me. It's not like you're going to be able to stop hounding your kids to wash their hands. It's not like getting swine flu is going to keep you well the rest of the year.

That's just... ugh.

There's a vaccine for crying out loud (assuming you can get hold of it).

And as I understand it, the whole point of the analogous chicken-pox parties (which are also "ugh") was to expose children to chicken pox while they were still children, because it's a much more serious illness for adults. H1N1 is H1N1, whether you get it in October, January, or March, and whether you're 5 or 50.

I never had chicken pox. should i be scared? lol

I would think if you got vaccinated or do get vaccinated you'd be fine. I had the chickenpox when I was in Kindergarten and the very next year they brought out the vaccine to the schools. I remember being mad because it made me miss two weeks of school (where all the best toys were).

As far as kids testing their immunity limits with "Swine Flu Parties"--good luck with that... Reckless, but okay, whatever. I know several adults who have gotten Swine Flu.

As soon as the vax is available to the general population, I will get it and hope I don't get the flu.

As far as kids not being vax, I thought I heard California includes it in its directive to going to school as with other childhood vaccines. Meaning, a child cannot attend a public school unless they get vaccinated.

There's a vaccine. I had to get it when I started med school. We had to get a Varicella titer to prove we'd had the chicken pox. I tested negative though my mom swears I had it at 4. I had to have 2 shots since I'm an adult. Now if I get exposed to chicken pox, I have to get my titer checked. If I test negative, I can't go to work for 5 days until I see if I get sick. If I do get the chicken pox, it will likely be a mild case because of the vaccine. Adults typically have much more severe cases than children do if they haven't been vaccinated. You can probably get the shots for $10 at the health unit.