Full Article (KIMT, Mason City)

CLEAR LAKE, IA–Chris Petersen’s been raising pigs for about 30 years.
“Oh, I’ve been raising pigs since high school in the 70’s–so it’s been a long time,” he said.
He spends a lot of time with pigs–but the current swine flu outbreak is not giving him any second thoughts.
“I think all the hogs in Iowa and this area are probably okay as of now,” he said. “But if this thing spreads it’ll be a huge problem.”

Swine flu is a lot like its human counterpart, except it normally spreads among pigs. People in close proximity to infected animals can catch it–and then spread it to other humans
“There’s no vaccine for the swine flu in hogs,” said Petersen.
Peterson said with today’s ability for folks to get to far flung places fast, we need to be extra careful to make sure it doesn’t spread. “This is serious–they need to jump on it right away,” he said.
No one has died in the U.S. in this latest outbreak, but more than 80 people have in Mexico.

“What we’re seeing here so far is no where near the severity of what we’re hearing about in Mexico,” said Dr. Richard Besser, the acting chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC is recommending that people be cautious and wash their hands often. If you do get sick, they’re asking you to stay home from school or work to avoid spreading the disease to others.

“This is moving fast but we view this as more than a marathon,” said Besser. “We do think this will continue to spread but we are taking aggressive action to minimize the effect on people’s health.”
While the CDC fights the outbreak, Petersen also wants to make sure people know its a virus–so you can’t catch it by eating pork.

“Keep eating meat,” he said. “This has nothing to do with the meat itself.”