My cruise sails May 9th and my friends are getting married in Grand Cayman, so I was very anxious at the thought of anything changing our itinerary. I called Carnival this morning and as of then they were not planning any destination changes but that was before the CDC declared the "major health" emergency. I have a feeling my Port of Call may be changed, or at least any exursions to mainland Mexico cancelled, but your cruise in June is far enough out to ease any panic. If we still stop in Mexico I will still get off the ship and do my excursion....but I will be wearing a respiratory mask and have several bottles of hand sanitizer!

I am scheduled to go to Progresso and Cozumel this Saturday on the Ecstasy.  First, I would not expect Carnival to cancel anything because the financial impact would be very high.  You are the only one looking out for you.  I do expect them to be prepared to handle an outbreak on the ship.  My biggest concern is that the ship is or was there this week and I am sure there is potential for the ship to get infected before we even get on.  All of this is changing fast.  Things could change dramatically in 4 days.  By June, much more will be known.

While everyone needs to keep an eye out for their own best interests, which includes their health, they also need to be wary of fretting themselves into a debilitating lather.  This is the information age, but unfortunately it isn't coinciding with the the knowledge age or the perspective age, either one.  As a result, we have information, but little context in which to place it.

Just for grins, I googled the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Report and dug up some data that you won't find any of the media giving out.  The more headlines, the more money they make; do you honestly think they're likely to report: "Swine Flu: Not a Problem"?  It is to laugh.

Anyway, for the first week of May this year, during the upswing of US swine flu confirmed cases, the MMR's table for "all deaths in 122 US cities" [which has a pneumonia & influenza subtotal] lists 780 or so deaths from pneumonia and influenza during the week.  Three weeks prior to that, in the middle of April, before swine flu was widely incubated, there were 860 P&I deaths.  In late March, before swine flu, there were over 1000 deaths from pneumonia and influenza.

With this swine flu "epidemic", there are fewer and fewer deaths the more swine flu picks up.

Now, yes, we are exiting "the cold and flu season" and therefore we ought to see exactly that phenomenon regardless.  Right?  So go back a year.  The numbers are virtually the same, statistical anomolies notwithstanding.  For an epidemic, it certainly has better PR than it would seem to warrant.

Every year in this country of 300 million people, between 30 and 60 million people [10-20%] come down with influenza [30-60 million cases, anyway; some individuals will get it multiple times -- lucky them], and typically 36,000 will die from it.  That is in a normal year, with normal everyday strains of influenza, with no "epidemic" occurring, and certainly no "pandemic" either.  There's been, what? 3 deaths in the US in a month from swine flu?  That's literally one-in-a-hundred-million, or .000001%.

But, it is always good to watch out.  Just don't go overboard.

By the way, influenza is a virus, not a bacteria; anti-bacterial hand sanitizers won't help.

Thank You for the information.  Hope everyone that should be reading this detailed valuable information, will be able to and soon.