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The government has made it out to be a hugely dangerous virus which will kill many thousands of people. They have told us about every death, scaring many people and making it appear that they will be next. They have launched campaigns and opened

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 for people who think they have this contagious virus. Many doctors will not see you if you are suspected of carrying it. And yet, for all this, when you look closely, in some ways it seems that the government is treating swine flu as a joke in some ways.

First of all, the hotlines. When a friend called one of these hotlines, the first question he was asked was; “Are you concious?” This, apparently, is one of the required questions that must be asked. It is clear that the people in charge of devising the questions for these hotlines see them as a joke, which suggests the same is true of swine flu itself.

In some ways, it seems that the government is not doing enough about swine flu, but at the same time they are doing too much.

If swine flu is such a big risk, why did they not take more drastic action by quarantining all passengers and staff associated with the flight from Mexico before they could begin spreading the virus around to others. But if swine flu is nothing to worry about, why bother to launch their “Sneeze in a Tissue” campaign, and spend a lot of money telling people to blow their noses into tissues. As if we didn’t do that already .

If you are one of those people who is worried about swine flu, my advice would be; stop worrying right now. For one thing, the symptoms of swine flu are just like those a normal cold, so you won’t know what type of flu you have anyway, and the doctors can’t diagnose it, even if they see you. You definitely won’t find out from ringing one of those hotlines! For another, ordinary flu has a much higher mortality rate, so if you can survive that you can survive swine flu. And don’t forget, here in the UK we get flu all the time, especially in the winter, thanks to our climate. This makes us more resistant to swine flu in the first place.

I will end by saying that although it is almost impossible to tell if you hae it or a normal cold, swine flu i real enough, but the government has made a huge deal out of it. In my opinion, they are using it to try and take the spotlight off things like the credit crunch and the problems in Iraq. So, be sensible, but don’t worry!