Many newspapers with a big headline “Swine Flu” have been placed on bookstand around the world. I also read some news about the Swine flu that all the articles report the new cases of Swine flu, how many people have been killed by the disease and government or organization warning.
It’s serious current situation all over the world. Many people have concerned their health and prevented by wearing a protective masks, cancel travel plan, including refrain from eating pork due to misunderstand of trust. So, the reactions of worldwide people cause several effects and problem to many countries.
Swine flu likely to hurt Thai pork
Source: POST REPORTERS
Published: 28/04/2009 at 12:00 AM
The outbreak of deadly swine flu in Mexico will inevitably affect Thailand's 70-billion-baht pork industry, experts say.
The psychological impact of the scare would affect sales, although not to the same extent as the 2003 bird-flu outbreak in Thailand, Betagro Group executive vice-president Nopporn Vayuchote said.
More than 60 million birds were culled across Thailand during that outbreak, which killed 17 people, and saw exports of raw chicken meat fall to zero while domestic
consumption shrank by about 20%, he said.
"It took three to four months for the Thai business to return to normal. But I'm sure the effects of the current situation would be shorter if consumers understand that the flu does not come from pigs, swine are actually the victims. It is a flu that is transmitted from person to person," Dr Nopporn said.
If you read the headline, do you think it looks familiar with the past situation in a case of bird flu? I really doubt that why it affects Thailand's 70-billion-baht pork industry. Even though this time the disease has not spread in Thailand and eating pork is not cause swine flu, but Thai people have still been fear that they will get swine flu from eating pork. So, the misunderstanding also affects a part of economic. Most people ban buying pork and then price of pork unfairly decrease.
US Stocks Down On Continued Swine Flu Fears
Source: THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE
By Peter A. McKay and Carolyn Cui
Published: APRIL 27, 2009, 2:00 P.M. ET
Also driving the markets down is the growing fear that the pandemic risk might slow down the recovery of global economy. Russia and China have banned imports of pork and pork products from Mexico and parts of the U.S., leading to concerns over lower consumption of the meat. Trade restrictions have raised fresh questions about the already-fragile global trade system fraught with recession. About 25% of U.S. pork was exported last year, according to the U.S. Meat Export Federation, which is in the process of determining the potential impact on the industry.
"For now, I'm thinking the effects of swine flu on the markets will be short-lived," said Darin Newsom, senior commodity analyst at the research firm DTN in Omaha, Neb. "I don't think it's quite at the pandemic level that everyone fears it is."
From above two statements, we can see that they said the situation would be short term effect and no pandemic level. But, the situation is now "pandemic is imminent" that is almost highest level (5/6). So, I doubt that their analyses were mistaken or WHO overreacts to alert on higher level.
INFLUENZA STATISTICS
Source: flufacts.com
The flu isn’t always thought of as a serious or life-threatening illness. Because of the dangers and complications it can have in older people, children, and people with health problems, the perception of flu severity is changing.
In the U.S., an estimated 25–50 million cases of the flu are currently reported each year leading to 150,000 hospitalizations and 30,000–40,000 deaths yearly. If these figures were to be estimated incorporating the rest of the world, there would be an average of approximately 1 billion cases of flu, around 3–5 million cases of severe illness, and 300,000–500,000 deaths annually.
Flu-related deaths can result from pneumonia and from exacerbations of cardiopulmonary conditions and other chronic diseases. Deaths of older adults account for more than 90% of deaths attributed to pneumonia and influenza.
It’s over 30,000 people only in USA and over 500,000 people death worldwide, but why they don’t have regular flu pandemic? Anyway, see the clip below that shows some opinion that I storngly agree.
The horrible economics of swine flu
By: Andrew Leonard (http://www.salon.com/)
Published: Monday, April 27, 2009 09:39 PDT
There is never a good time for a global pandemic that kills millions, but from an economic perspective, you couldn't pick a worse moment than right now for a scary outbreak of swine flu.
Consider, for example, how Bloomberg News opened its summary of a World Bank report in October projecting the economic effects of a pandemic (found via MinnPost):
A flu pandemic could kill 71 million people worldwide and push the global economy into a "major global recession" costing more than $3 trillion, according to raised estimates by the World Bank of a worst-case scenario.
A slump in tourism, transportation and retail sales, as well as workplace absenteeism and lower productivity caused by a "severe" outbreak, may cut global gross domestic product by 4.8 percent, the Washington-based bank said in an internal report updated last month and obtained by Bloomberg News today. Economic modeling by the bank in June 2006 estimated GDP would drop by 3.01 percent, or about $2 trillion.
That was in October. Since that point, without any help from the flu, the global economy spiraled into recession. The latest report from the International Monetary Fund, which calls the current global economic downturn the worst "by far" since the Great Depression, forecasts a global decline in GDP for this year of 1.3 percent. That's pretty bad all by itself, but shoveling another 4.8 percent decline on top of that would be a disaster of pretty much unimaginable proportions. [The flu should not have happened during a recession]
Mexico City, reports the Washington Post (found via Hilzoy) is a ghost town: The virus, for which there is no vaccine for humans, has nearly brought Mexico City to a halt. Normally congested downtown streets in this city of 20 million were almost empty Saturday, and of the few people who ventured outside, many said they did so only out of necessity. Soldiers posted at subway stations handed out face masks to passersby from the back of armored vehicles. Some pedestrians covered their mouths and noses with scarves and rags.
Ryan Avent, blogging at the now-apparently-defunct Portfolio, titles his own post contemplating the economic impact of a pandemic "Sinking Animal Spirits," and that's exactly the point.
Millions of people around the world are already feeling cautious about everything from buying a new car to visiting their family for a quick vacation. Their reticence, while utterly logical, also hamstrings the economy's chances to start growing again. According to the Bloomberg summary of the World Bank report, the efforts by people attempting to avoid getting sick are far more economically damaging than the actual healthcare costs associated with a pandemic. [Strongly agree]
Changed behavior by individuals in the face of a pandemic, such as reduced air travel in order to avoid infection in the enclosed space of a plane, avoiding travel to infected destinations and spurning restaurants and mass transport, could account for 60 percent of costs during a pandemic, the bank said.
"People's efforts to avoid infection are five times more important than mortality and more than twice as important as illness" in terms of economic impact, the authors said. In the worst-case, they assumed that air travel would slump by 20 percent for the whole year, and that tourism,
restaurant meals, and use of mass transportation would decline by the same amount. [Because people think that home is the safetiest place, so they do not go anywhere and do not buy anything until they ensure that there is no virus.]
The European health commissioner, reports Doug Merrill at the A Fistful of Euros blog, is already recommending "avoiding non-essential travel to Mexico." Global air travel has already been battered by consumers hunkering down to get through the recession; if this flu outbreak gets worse, the domino effect on a global economy that was already breathing through a respirator will be fearsome.
Reaction:
1. WHO announces latest level that makes people reduces such activities and impact on the overall economy.
2. The number of dead people in swine flu case is normal rate, if we compare with death annually static of regular flu.
3. Most people have still confused about the virus and have banned eating pork, so it’s affected export pork industry, especially in USA.
4. The situation affects world GDP that would fall by 1.3% this year.
5. Thailand doesn’t get swine flu and no people dead, but the situation also affects Thai pork industry.
Conclusion:
Many people are over reaction with swine flu because it is fast spreading that makes around 300 people died in a month. But they don’t realize how many people die from the flu every year? It’s over 30,000 people only in USA and over 500,000 people worldwide, but no one concern about it. Perhaps, government and media triggers and make the situation sound terrible. Most people also overreact, so it affects people life, tourism, and trading that are overall economics.
On May 4, Health Officials begin to ease public alerts about swine flu. If people can ease with the situation, the overall economics will get better. However, it’s not easy to recover the situation, if there is no truth from government and media.
