Swine Flu in Indonesia : Unfolding the Facts — (Part 3)
Posted on September 30th, 2009 in Global Focus Contagious_Disease, Pandemic, Pollution
Swine flu spread in Islamic School
In August 2009, Indonesia was shocked by unpredictable news. In recently weeks, the students of Islamic schools in some provinces contracted swine flu. The first case occured at Pesantren Dar el-Qolam, West Java. There were 4000 students who suspected as H1N1 infected, and 80 of them were H1N1 confirmed. Then, the same case occured at Pesantren Tebu Ireng, East Java, in which five students were suspected. At Pesantren Zainul Hassan, Probolinggo, 37 students were suspected.
There are some schools that I do not mention here. The big question is how they got this virus. Until now, the answer remains a mistery.
Moeslems have been known not eat pork. Pork is forbidden. If they eat it accidentally, they will throw it out at once. Not today, tomorrow or the day after, they will be doing it whenever they know that they have eaten pork. They do not breed pigs and try to not get close contact with pigs. So, where do they get swine flu from? How? Since there’s no explanation where this virus came from and when these students might have contacted with, we can conclude that may be it was not a directly contact, probably an indirectly contact. This following could be a good explanation.
Focus, how did H1N1 virus spread?
People get H1N1 virus from much the same way most virusess are contracted. They touches a surface that has the virus on it, then touches their face, the nose or eyes or mouth, without washing first, and the virus invades thru the mucous membranes. Very important to avoid touching the face without first washing your hands, especially when you have been out in public.
There were several pigs farms such as Kuningan, Karawang, Tangerang, Bandung, Bogor, Yogyakarta, Bali, etc. From Veterinarian Department 2009, NTT (Nusa Tenggara Timur) was area with the most pigs population (1,6 million), then Bali 900 thousand pigs, West Kalimantan 876 thousand pigs, North Sumatra 760 thousands pigs, South Sulawesi 530 thousand pigs, Papua 507 thousand pigs, and the rest 2,2 million pigs spread in some places.
I noticed that pigs farms were usually built on highlands, or area with a little bit lower temperature, because it’s good for pigs to grow up. Normal temperature of pigs is about 39⁰C. In low temperature (below 30⁰C) pigs would increase their temperature by eating more food. This was what farmers wanted. In high temperature, pigs would decrease their temperature by eating less food and evaporating through skin. If this high temperature continued, pigs might have got heat stress. Close and Mount 1978 found that heat stress on 55-110 pound-weight-pigs began when environment temperature was about 30⁰C with 50% humidity. Also, high temperature would influence pigs’ reproductive system and it sounded not good at all.
Highlands get higher rainfall than other places. It’s really important to keep that area green and clean. Overall, highlands are water permeating areas. There’re many river which people can use it daily for bathing, washing, etc. In Indonesia, people would like to built these pigsties near the river, even above the river. It made them easy to clean these pigsties and threw the waste to the water. Eventhough they didn’t use the river, these area would permeate the waste and brought anything in it.
CDC said that no research has been completed on the suspectibility of 2009 H1N1 flu virus to conventional drinking water treatment processes. However, recent studies have demonstrated that free chlorine levels typically used in drinking water treatment are adequate to inactivate highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza. It is likely that other influenza viruses such as 2009 H1N1 would also be similarly inactivated by chlorination. To date, there have been no documented human cases of influenza caused by exposure to influenza-contaminated drinking water. Unfortunately, there was no water treatment processes for rivers in Indonesia, nor after poluted by pigs waste.
If this water was drank by people, what did possibility happen? Would you be sure that the water was not containing H1N1 virus? Some of the livestock were free from H1N1 virus, even until now. But we don’t know since when they were free and how long it will keep like that. No one can guarantee. Because, once they found it, it was a warning sign, and the owner must allow the pigs terminated. Until now, there’re still not known which rivers were poluted by H1N1 virus. Before government decide to find out, the polution has been being continued.
Related posts:
- Swine Flu in Indonesia : Unfolding the Facts — (Part 1)
- Swine Flu : Changed Name Turned Into Debate
- ARE CONDOMS EDUCATION OR ALLUSION TOOLS?
- Penyakit-Penyakit Yang Ditularkan Melalui Hewan (I)
- Penyakit-Penyakit Yang Ditularkan Melalui Hewan (II)
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