There is a lot in the news this week about the current swine flu outbreak, officially called 2009 H1N1.  One thing that I'm not hearing mentioned in the mainstream media that is being talked about on some blogs is where it probably originated.  The area around the U.S. and Mexican border, on both sides, is dotted with large pig farms of the type usually called factory farms.  The boy currently identified as patient #1 lives in a small town where there is also one of these factory farms.  
    On these factory farms, sprawling one-story buildings that cover acres, contain thousands of pigs in very cramped conditions, and the sows are kept constantly nursing or pregnant.  These conditions cause a lot of stress in animals just as they do in people and, like humans, when animals are constantly stressed, their health deteriorates and their immune system becomes week.  And in those tight quarters, if one gets sick, it quickly spreads.  The big American meat corporations that own these farms are aware of that so the pigs are given antibiotics and other shots to prevent illness.  The waste from the pigs contain those drugs and it gets in the water and soil.  The result is often the creation of strains of bacteria that is resistant to antibiotics, the so called super bugs.  In addition, these drugs may trigger mutation of viruses (2009 H1N1 appears to be a mutation of  the 1998 strain which was traced to a large pig farm).  
    The same is true for bird flu.  It is most often found on large poultry farms, but is seldom found in wild birds.  More good reasons to shut down these inhumane farms.
    It should also be noted that, at this point this outbreak is really quite mild and people are panicking for nothing.  Egypt's decision to slaughter all 300,000 pigs in the country to keep out the flu is nothing short of insanity.  Once these new flu strains get into humans, it is almost entirely spread by people, not animals.  Regular flu has actually killed more people this year than H1N1, not to mention various other contagious diseases.