Spring Break
Swine flu highlights perils of illegal immigration into the United States
Ian Bezek
Issue date: 4/28/09 Section: Opinion
The Spanish flu of 1918 to 1920 killed roughly 50 million people as it spread across the globe. Now the world potentially faces another such global health catastrophe.
The swine flu of 2009 has already taken the lives of more than 100 people and has sickened people in at least 12 countries.
There have been variants of the swine flu for years as it is a virus that is normally transmitted among pigs but that occasionally spreads to humans. According to Bloomberg News, in 1976, researchers became worried about a strain of swine flu and immunized Americans to prevent its spread.
The 2009 strain of swine flu has mixed its genes with other strains of the flu and mutated into a new disease against which we have little immunity. The result has been that the mortality rate has risen significantly - perhaps as high as 10 percent.
Instead of killing only a few people as normal influenza strains do, the swine flu is quite lethal. Normal influenza generally kills only the young, the elderly and those with compromised immune systems.
The swine flu, by contrast, seems to be most lethal in people between the ages of 20 and 45, according to Mexican news reports.
Since people of that age are more likely to come into contact with others, the disease can spread much faster than the normal flu, where the carriers are generally immobile.
The result of this is that the world is faced with a rapidly spreading epidemic to which there are few answers. Already, according to a Google Map that tracks the spread of the disease, the Swine Flu is in California, Texas, New York, Ohio, Kansas and Indiana. By the time you read this, it will no doubt have spread further, perhaps even to Colorado.
How did the disease get this far so quickly? While some of it may have inevitably gotten here, one must ask if we could have kept the disease out of the country if we enforced our border with Mexico.
As I've frequently argued, it is dangerous to leave a border open with a developing nation. Who knows what will come in? Drugs, gangs, weapons, terrorists and even, apparently, deadly diseases.
The swine flu of 2009 has already taken the lives of more than 100 people and has sickened people in at least 12 countries.
There have been variants of the swine flu for years as it is a virus that is normally transmitted among pigs but that occasionally spreads to humans. According to Bloomberg News, in 1976, researchers became worried about a strain of swine flu and immunized Americans to prevent its spread.
The 2009 strain of swine flu has mixed its genes with other strains of the flu and mutated into a new disease against which we have little immunity. The result has been that the mortality rate has risen significantly - perhaps as high as 10 percent.
Instead of killing only a few people as normal influenza strains do, the swine flu is quite lethal. Normal influenza generally kills only the young, the elderly and those with compromised immune systems.
The swine flu, by contrast, seems to be most lethal in people between the ages of 20 and 45, according to Mexican news reports.
Since people of that age are more likely to come into contact with others, the disease can spread much faster than the normal flu, where the carriers are generally immobile.
The result of this is that the world is faced with a rapidly spreading epidemic to which there are few answers. Already, according to a Google Map that tracks the spread of the disease, the Swine Flu is in California, Texas, New York, Ohio, Kansas and Indiana. By the time you read this, it will no doubt have spread further, perhaps even to Colorado.
How did the disease get this far so quickly? While some of it may have inevitably gotten here, one must ask if we could have kept the disease out of the country if we enforced our border with Mexico.
As I've frequently argued, it is dangerous to leave a border open with a developing nation. Who knows what will come in? Drugs, gangs, weapons, terrorists and even, apparently, deadly diseases.
Viewing Comments 1 - 10 of 19
MoralMoney
posted 4/28/09 @ 10:24 AM MST
Damn, Bezek. I'm beginning to think Tom Tancredo spawned you in a lab using chimp sperm and a withered egg from Ann Coultier. Due to the fear and irrational panic caused by the illustriously named swine flu epidemic, the CDC recently noted that 36,000 people die each year from the REGULAR FLU, while there have been a whopping 40 cases of swine flu reported in the US. (Continued…)
StJakk
posted 4/28/09 @ 11:16 AM MST
Thank you Ian for an intelligent POV concerning this potentially huge problem.............
MoralMoney
posted 4/28/09 @ 3:54 PM MST
Due to the fear and irrational panic caused by the illustriously named swine flu epidemic, the CDC recently noted that 36,000 people die each year from the REGULAR FLU, while there have been a whopping 68 cases of swine flu reported in the US. (Continued…)
Brooks Phillips
posted 4/28/09 @ 9:57 PM MST
This will go down as the stupidest article ever put in the collegian. Kid, do you even realize that the normal flu kills over 30,000 people in the USA every year. (Continued…)
Shane
posted 4/29/09 @ 2:11 PM MST
Well, that's typical. Anyone who makes a sensible argument to get tough on illegal aliens is labeled a racist. Face it, that is the only argument that the far left and Hispanic Supremacists have against enforcing our nation's immigration laws and opposing amnesty for illegal aliens. (Continued…)
Bigots do as bigots are
posted 4/29/09 @ 4:17 PM MST
Wow! What a bigot you is !
MoralMoney
posted 4/29/09 @ 6:13 PM MST
SWINE FLU UPDATE:
Now 100 people in the US have the dreaded swine flu. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my god!!!! That's 0.000003% of the population! Funny thing is the epicenter of the US cases are in New York and come from students who came back from a spring break in Cancun:
http://www. (Continued…)
Nelle
posted 4/29/09 @ 7:00 PM MST
So when white american children contract the flu on vacation it's illegal immigrants fault?
edla67
posted 4/30/09 @ 12:33 AM MST
Liberals, open border fans: so because the Mexican flu, aka the swine flu, comes from Mexico, we are not allowed to say it?
Please take off your politically correct mask!
And let's secure the border for good
Mayberry
posted 5/01/09 @ 9:46 AM MST
Ian, this is the worst argument I've ever seen. The H1N1 flu came to the US through air travel - kids on Spring Break in Cancun, for instance.
There is absolutely no proof that illegal immigration has anything to do with an outbreak of flu. (Continued…)
Post a Comment