Many people have heard the recent scary outbreak of swine flu. It seems to have come from nowhere, but this thing is real. At the time I'm writing this, according to press reports there have been about 1600 reported cases of infection, with about 159 deaths. Yikes, simple math says 10% mortality rate so far...
Many people are saying they don't have to worry about swine flu because all the cases they're hearing about seem to come from Mexico. Well I hate to tell ya but there have been over 40 reported cases in the US, with half of them coming in from New York. Disease spreads fast in big cities. (Glad I'm out of Boston on the 6th!)
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has been making use of the popular social networking site Twitter to warn people about swine flu. They are giving people tips on how to avoid contracting the flu, and if infected, how to avoid passing it on to others.
http://twitter.com/cdcemergency (21,000 followers)
and
http://twitter.com/CDC_eHealth (2,600 followers)
These Twitter accounts are making use of the widespread use of Twitter to get word out about swine flu. Anyone following these Twitter profiles will see immediately when a new "tweet" has come out regarding any new information about the outbreak. Of course this is still being reported on television, but given the extreme popularity of twitter, whos to say which medium is quicker for spreading information?
In my opinion the CDC made an excellent decision to use twitter to pass on information about swine flu, it can only help. This is a brilliant example against all the naysayers of social networking sites, and I look forward to seeing more technology being used this way
For those interested, google has put together this map which traces known cases of swine flu. Lets hope the cure is found soon
Check out this video, it's fairly informative, interview with an infected family in Texas:
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