Swine Flufeatured
Thank God we aren’t going to Mexico again, LOL.
It’ll probably bite me in the ass, but I’m not too worried about the Swine Flu. I remember the Avian Flu and SARS crazes. I was going to school in downtown Chicago and taking public transportation all the time (and believe me, Chicago public transportation is not the cleanliest mode of transportation) and it was just never as big as it seemed in my little corner of the world.
I am a little worried because we’re sailing out of New York, where there has been dozens of cases reported (even though they seemed to be contained to one school) and I’d really hate for this to impact our vacation.
It seems that avoiding Swine Flu is much like avoiding Noro, so here’s what we’ll do:
1. We always travel with a travel-sized can of Lysol spray. I think this time we’ll also bring Clorox wipes, and we plan to wipe down all of the handles, remotes, desk spaces, etc in our cabins. With the lacksidasical approach to cleaning our last steward took, we’ll feel better disinfecting everything ourselves.
2. After Stephanie got sick on our last cruise, I figured it might be from handling the food serving spoons on the Lido deck. People were coughing everywhere on the boat, and coughing into their hands, and then touching the serving spoons. This is how disease is spread. This time, we’ll probably grab an extra napkin and use it to handle the spoons when we’re eating on the Lido deck. Or Carnival might employ the method they use when there’s a Noro outbreak, when they have servers serve you your food on the Lido deck.
3. Lots of hand washing. I’ve read a lot of people simply thinking using extra antibacterial will prevent illness. Swine Flu is a VIRUS, antibacterials kill BACTERIA. Antibacterial is simply ineffective in preventing viruses, like Swine Flu. We’ll be washing our hands a lot.
4. If we need to cough or sneeze, we do so properly: into the crook of the elbow. I think 99% of the world coughs or sneezes into their hands, and I think 100% of those don’t run to wash their hands every time they do so. This is how disease is spread. If you need to cough or sneeze, do so into the crook of your arm because you won’t infect other people that way.
Hopefully, this will die down a bit by the time we leave, but I doubt it. We’re obviously not going to cancel, so all we can do is try to limit our exposure.
