WHO Upgrades Flu to Pandemic

The World Health Organization announced yesterday that swine flu had reached pandemic status, meaning that the flu is easily spread in multiple regions of the world. At least 74 countries are home to infected patients of this mild influenza, which appears to have a similar death rate to the 1957 Asian flu of 0.6%. (The deadly 1918 influenza killed 2.5% of those affected.) Nonetheless, the WHO expects H1N1 to affect millions over the next year or so.