# 3720
Tom Vilsack, Secretary of the Department of Agriculture yesterday lectured the press over the use of the term `Swine Flu’ when referring to our pandemic influenza strain now circling the globe.
It was, he insisted, `not swine flu’, and that H1N1 was the `scientifically correct name’.
Well, he got it wrong on both counts.
H1N1, for decades, has referred to seasonal H1N1, and so calling this pandemic virus simply H1N1 is confusing (and imprecise) at best.
While the pork industry may not like it, this virus is a `swine flu’, and it has been circulating in hogs for years until it very recently made the jump from pigs to humans.
What this isn’t is `Classical Swine Flu’, which is also an H1N1 virus, although genetically different from the 2009 pandemic virus. Classical Swine Flu was first isolated in pigs in 1930, and was probably introduced to swine during the 1918 pandemic.
While it may not be good for business, pigs are a major host for a variety of influenza viruses, and sometimes they do jump to humans.
This from the CDC Factsheet (notice . . . they call it Swine Flu)
Key Facts about Swine Influenza (Swine Flu)
Over the years, different variations of swine flu viruses have emerged. At this time, there are four main influenza type A virus subtypes that have been isolated in pigs: H1N1, H1N2, H3N2, and H3N1. However, most of the recently isolated influenza viruses from pigs have been H1N1 viruses.
Six months into this outbreak, trying to change the name that billions of people know this pandemic virus by is not only impossible, it is ludicrous.
If it hurts the swine industry, I’m sorry. But that pig is already out of the pen.
Perhaps it will inspired the pork industry to do a better job of surveillance for influenza viruses in their herds if they know that pandemics are going to be named after them.
Sometimes I use the term `novel H1N1’ in my blog, simply for variety, although I often use the term `Swine Flu’ and even on occasion, `The virus formerly known as Swine’.
Why invoke the word `swine’?
Because people looking for information are going to use `Swine flu’ as a search term, that’s why.
The Revere’s over at Effect Measure weigh in on this subject this morning as well in Sorry: it is properly called swine flu.
