Contemporary issue in public health and health promotion Essay

Contemporary issue in public health and health promotion - Essay Example The most prevalent subtypes of the swine flu that were known were H1N1, H1N2, H2N1, and H3N1. Swine flu or the swine influenza virus is considered common in the world especially in places that have large pig populations. Since the virus originates in pigs, it is easy to get affected by the virus when a person is in constant contact with pigs. However, the virus transmission from the pigs to human is not common. Since the transmission of the virus from the pigs to humans is rare, there are minute chances of a human being suffering from human flu. This is due to the reaction of the body to the virus. With such a reaction, the virus will not result into human flu but will only release antibodies in the blood stream. Such a situation is commonly referred to as zoonotic swine flu. It is declared that people that are in constant contact with pigs are at a higher risk of contacting swine flu infection as compared to people that have rare contact with pigs. The first case of swine flu was reported in Scotland, shortly after a flight from Mexico on the 27th of April in 2009 (Gallagher, 2013:1). This case was diagnosed and reported to have strains of H1N1 virus (Gallagher, 2013:1). After this first cases, the infections spread across the world rapidly. By the 17th of May, more than a hundred cases of infection had been confirmed. This was a shocker to the whole world due to the way the cases were spreading in the whole world. Previously, it was considered that swine flu could only affect the people that are in constant contact with pigs. However, this was not the case after the confirmation of the first case of swine flu. In this situation, the swine flu infections were spreading from one person to another when there is close contact. This was a situation that led to outburst by many nations to ensure the spread of the swine flu was controlled and maintained at the lowest minimum (Great