Re the swine flu. Here in New Zealand we are nervous too. My son came back from the USA on Saturday. On Sunday he went to a large event. On Sunday evening he heard on the news that a party on the plane he was on were returning from Mexico and had contracted the swine flu and that the Public Health department was contacting all the people on the plane. On Monday we phoned Public Health to say that he had been on the plane, he felt fine and should he go to school. I aslo asked if I should go to work as I work in a hospital setting. Eventually he was told to stay at home in "voluntary quarantine" until Friday and I was told to go to work. He was given Tamiflu. We now hear that a prescription is no longer required for Tamiflu but people have to go to the pharmacist in person exhibiting flu symptons to get it. The Public Health instructions are to stay in if you have flu or flu like symptons so as not to spread the disease. Seems to me the media are having a field day spreading hysteria, won't be fun for you Ambulance people. While people are busy worrying about this it seems at the moment we are more likely to die crossing the road. What surprises me I suppose is the dissonance between what the news channels say and reality (another of your points I agree with Tom) and also the way the action being taken looks like if there really is a pandemic it will increase rather than decrease the infection rate.