How To Prevent Yourself Catching The H1N1 Swine Flu Virus

Quick tips to help you avoid catching the H1N1 swine flu, helpful advice on keeping safe and covering up. How to develop healthy habits to keep the germs out of your body.

Ok so what's Swine Flu, better known as the H1N1 flu? It's very basically a flu influenza virus carried by pigs all across the world. The reason for its sudden rise up the health warning levels and appearance in the news is that it now transmits through human to human contact and is slowly spreading and multiplying across the globe. It is not guaranteed to be fatal and should be seen as a slightly stronger and more advanced strain of a regular flu virus. 

So the swine flu symptoms are similar to a regular flu virus, these are ;

- Lack of appetite
- Fever over 100F
- Muscle pain
- Runny Nose
- Headaches
- Chills
- Fatigue
- Sore throat and Cough

Certain cases have also involved vomiting and diarrhea. As you can see though, the symptoms are quite similar to a regular flu virus. To know if you have it, a swab of your nose and throat must be analyzed in a laboratory. In a lot of the cases where swine flu has caused death, underlying factors have been prevalent such as existing medical conditions. You should try not allow the media and furore to control your fear and common sense when it comes to swine flu.

So this is a quick checklist of things you can do to help protect yourself against possible infection of the flu virus. These preventative methods are almost the same as the ones you'd use to protect yourself from catching a cold or flu from somebody.

Cover up - We should remember that it spreads easily through coughing and sneezing so first and foremost, cover up. The sheer velocity of a sneeze insures that germs travel out far and fast in the vicinity of the person infected.

Wash your hands - It's so important to keep washing your hands every so often throughout the day, regardless of wether you think they may be dirty or not. Frequent hand washing will prevent the lingering germs finding their way into your system when you touch your mouth, eyes, nose etc.

Watch your distance - Be aware enough to keep a safe distance if you can from others who may be infected. Regardless of wether you know what they have or don't have. If in the case of a community being infected, it's a good idea to keep indoors and make other arrangements with your work. This will insure you have minimal contact with flu or swine flu infected people until they have recovered.

So there you go, pretty simple right? Well that's basically as there is to it. However if you do feel you have contracted a flu virus you should seek an appointment with your doctor as soon as possible for confirmation and medication. Remember though to stay positive and do not let social media add to your fears. Stay sensible, listen to common sense and keep healthy.