Mention the swine flu to a principal and they break out into a cold sweat. They worry the mere mention of the words around their school will cause a small panic that will drain attendance.
Are they paranoid? I don’t think so; instead I believe they’re responding to what they see around them. If their school is “tagged” as having swine flu, they know that the spike in absences will include a good number of students who aren’t sick at all, just afraid of getting sick.
A few weeks ago my youngest son went though a nasty little bout with the flu – it was confirmed to be type A influenza but not sub typed for H1N1. We assume it was H1N1 because epidemiologists tell us that swine flu is the only “type A” out there.
He is perfectly fine now – back to his old self. And if it was in fact swine flu, he should have the antibodies in his system that make him immune just like the lucky few who stood out in the cold – and perhaps caught a cold – so they could get the vaccination.
He hasn’t been going around bragging about it; he doesn't wear a t-shirt proclaiming "I punched out the pig!" Then again, he hasn’t made a secret of it either.
and so it is more than a little disappointing to me that he reports a few of his friends have been treating him differently lately: keeping their distance, limiting contact, and canceling long- standing dates.
A little crazy.
