man, this whole swine flu thing sure seems to be overblown to me. cnn.com had a great commentary piece by jack cafferty yesterday. in it, he writes:

More than 13,000 people in the U.S. have died of complications from seasonal flu since January; and it’s expected to continue killing hundreds of people a week. In total, about 36,000 people a year die from the flu in this country; and worldwide, the annual death toll is somewhere between 250,000 and 500,000.

there are 257 cases of swine flu identified, worldwide, with 1 death in the US and 7 in mexico. hardly seems like a level-5 epidemic to me.

what do you think?

(btw: if you want to check if you have swine flu, here’s a handy little online app that will tell you, with a very high level of probability.)