anleja

Very true, but 25 to 50 million people (of only 1.8 billion) in 1918-19 died from what many scientists are a calling a milder strain of what they think we may see. I suppose even 50 million of 1.8 billion is not TOO large, but also keep in mind that the world population is more than 3 times that size, in addition to the world being a much smaller place, with people going from one continent to another a very frequent and common occurance... much more than in 1918.

Humans DO build up immunities, but if this strain spreads from human to human there is no one alive who would have a natural immunity to it.

One more thing... during the Spanish flu, the only populated area in the world to not have any documented cases of this was Marajó. Any place that was NOT Marajó had this flu.

I'm not saying people should freak out, but I do think it would be foolish to chalk this up to a mere media-driven hysteria. "An ounce of prevention" etc etc.

*edit* I wrote all this assuming you made the media statement to mean that people are over reacting. I suppose you MAY have meant it to merely state that we are more aware of what is happening in the world as far as this flu thing goes... but people rarely have good things to say about the media (and for good reason, but I think I'll just stick to this particular topic).