ill informed opinion on swine flu and general musings on the relevance of the news.

Hello there.

I was quite amazed 2 days ago to find out that a boy who goes to the school where I work at has taken ill with swine flu. While he has been to America with the school band (who have since been quarantined), i was still quite amazed that he managed to come into contact with one of the (at the time of his visit) 200-300 people out of 303,824,640 who suffered from the disease. What is also interesting (and concerning) is that the other people have been quarantined as a result, and a few of them have started to show symptoms. The odds of this are quite mind boggling (less that 1,500 people have contracted the diesease worldwide), and it is quite the stark reminder that it is not merely a story to concern everyone else. Fortunately, the sufferers seem to be either recovering or handling the ailment well, so no concern there.

What is slightly more worrying is the realisation that the news does not merely apply to everyone else. At my age, some people (but by no means all) make the mistake of assuming that the unfortunate events reported in the news have no relevance to them, that they have no danger of interfering in their private, irrelevant lives. I was (and to be fair, probably still am) one of these people, but now the proximity of the flu has got me thinking. What if I have trouble getting home because of quarantine issues? Also, I assumed that when I returned home from my gap year that I would still have a job waiting for me at the local petrol station, but who's to say I won't be re-hired because of the depression?

I realise these thoughts have probably come to me a bit late (most people realise the news is relevant when they are 12 or so), but I just thought that was a bit interesting.

Look out for an opinion on the Spanish horror movie "REC" soon.

Conor.