Swine flu claims its first U.S. citizen

May 5, 2009 – 9:37 pm – No Comment

The first person in the United States to die due to the swine flu was a Mexican toddler who was being held at a Houston, Texas hospital. Now, the first United States citizen has died as a direct result of the swine flu.

The 33 year old woman lived near a popular border crossing town in Texas and had chronic health problems. On top of that, she also had given birth to a healthy baby while sick with the flu at the hospital.

This is, still, much more mild than even seasonal flu outbreaks. Thousands succumb to the seasonal flu every year and it doesn’t ever get as much attention as the swine flu. I am only talking about it because it is popular news and directly affects trade with other countries and the United States. At this point, I think that it is mainly hype. Of course, this is no consolation to the families of people who have the swine flu or who have died as a result of contracting it, but typically the people who have very serious cases of this are the same people who would have very serious cases of the seasonal (regular) flu.