Swine flu update in Shanghai Pudong International Airport

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Swine flu update in Shanghai Pudong International Airport

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uploaded by chezjin

Make sure you do not travel with an abnormal body temperature, in particular, not to China. When we flew back to Shanghai yesterday June 6, My son and I witnessed the seriousness of the preventive measure for containing the spread of swine flu (H1N1), a virus strain usually hosted by pigs. However the H1N1 virus has mutant genes and can be transmitted from human to human. Once infected with the virus, patients exhibit symptoms, including sneezing, coughing and a high body temperature, similar to that caused by seasonal influenza.

During the flight, we spotted a few people who were wearing masks. This reminded me the similar scene I observed in Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG) when I went to Los Angeles three weeks ago. At that time, many people also wore white masks at PVG. Surprisingly, when I arrived at LAX and later traveled to New Mexico and Texas, I've not seen and felt anything that could be related to something called "pandemic". No white mask was ever spotted.

It was not immediately certain to me whether the regional difference of the public attitude toward the virus is cultural or due to different media focuses. China had experienced recent outbreaks of SARS and bird flu, which might explain why the public response to the swine flu event are more involved here.

When our China-bound airplane (an Airbus 340-600 operated by China Eastern Airlines from LAX to PVG) approached PVG before landing, our flight attendants took out some pen-looking detectors and read body temperature of all of us by pointing the gauges to our foreheads. Fortunately, we did not show any alarming symptoms. Several health persons wearing white coats boarded the airplane and started measuring our body temperature, again. The entire process took several minutes and proceeded smoothly as all passengers cooperated with the health authorities quite well.