[gaijin]

MEXICAN FLU!

he who controls the terms of the debate, controls the DEBATE.

[HighlyOpinionated]

I love Israelis and their great sense of sense.

[combat_boots]

No, it’s the 0bama bug, as he is Typhoid Barry.

[SouthTexas]

ping

[Gordon Greene]

Man, I love the Israelis and the Jewish people. I don’t mind a bit that they call it the Mexican flu or any other thing they want to call it but you can’t deny its origin.

It is, in fact “Swine” flu.

[Secret Agent Man]

How bout Mexipig Flu?

[GOPsterinMA]

Am I the only one who thinks this could be a terrorist attack?

[BobbyT]

That’s wacist!

[FreepShop1]

Brilliant! Israel picks up on FreeRepublic talking points!!!

[Will88]

Israel renames unkosher swine flu (they call it Mexiflu)

Well, they've gone from unkosher to Un-PC. But Mexi-Flu is about what it should be called, especially since swine flu is a term that's been around for years and this the new flu is significantly different from the old swine flu.

[justiceseeker93]

I don't care if the term “Mexican flu” stigmatizes Mexico, but I see no reason why any Jew can't use the term “swine flu,” if the causative virus originally was confined to the pig population. The Jewish ban on eating pork is unrelated to the airborne transmission of the virus from swine to man, so if a Jew contracts the illness, it hardly implies that he is not observing the Jewish dietary laws. I presume, therefore, that the renaming of the virus by Dr. Litzman was nothing more than an instance of political correctness, Israeli style.

[AdmSmith]

Natural infections by influenza type A is in humans, swine, horses, seals, mink, whales and birds (avian).

It is normally named from where it is taken and the type. The present virus has the following 8 components in its RNA, with origin:

PB2 Avian North America
PB1 Human circa 1993
PA Swine Eurasia +/-
HA Swine North America
NP Swine Eurasia +/-
NA Swine Eurasia
MP Swine Eurasia
NS Swine Eurasia +/-

It is the hemagglutinin (HA or in this case H sub-type 1 = H1) that binds to the cell and causes the virus to enter, this is from Swine hence the name Swine influenza. However, naming influenza virus is not easy as the other components should be considered as well, especially the Neuraminidase (NA or in this case N sub-type 1 = N1) that releases the virus from the infected cell and causes it to spread. Then there are differences among the sub-types i.e. a H1 is not the same as another H1.

Traditionally the name is reflected by the species and the geographical region from where the sample is taken and identified. This would give the name Influenza A Virus A/California(04/99(H1N1) as written here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genomes/FLU/SwineFlu.html

However, the nick name could be anything like Spanish flu, Asian flu or, in this case, Swine flu.

[forkinsocket]

‘Swine flu’ name won’t be changed in Israel

NEW YORK (JTA) — The swine flu will not take any new names in Israel despite the unease of a health official from a fervently religious party.