The public records the accounts of the illnesses that had claimed millions of lives. SARS, bird flu, and the recent AH1N1 most commonly known as swine flu: these are but some of those well publicized due to the heightened alert placed around the world as the call to watch-out for it was campaigned.

Flights were cancelled, shipments were stranded, and people were afraid. There is no telling whether how direct these diseases can be, or how they can be accumulated. If they are to be analyzed these are no different than the colds we acquire or the fever that made us delirious as times. The question is how they, the said ailments, can be more known that the public records fear on them.

The Black Death and the Spanish Influenza are but two of history’s most well known ailments. At present, these are easily cured. But what made them alert society of the devastation in man (the death they bring with them) is the fact that their victims are not in the usual age which was considered weak. When the Spanish flu hit, death raised on those who were at their twenties to their forties, a clear example of the theory what made these illnesses noticeable. Children and the elderly were the only ones considered weak and could easily acquire these.

The bird’s flu and swine flu all have the same common tangent that made them the headlines in health news. They were first ailments of animals which got transferred to the human system and evolved to something that can be deadly if not detected and met earlier.

In the case of bird’s flu, the illness reached a worldwide alert as birds migrated carrying it with them. There were messages as "don’t go near birds" because of the belief that this is one way to transmit it. This actually goes the same with swine flu.

The controversial illness that hit the year 2009: AH1N1, also known as the swine flu, originated from pigs. The first human reported this year to have acquired such was a young boy from Mexico. This report was followed by many more that the world was again on high alert. Like the previous illnesses, this one also made airports cancelling flights and food checked. Establishments were warned to isolate those with symptoms and were required to have a disinfecting procedure to follow. The suspected victims of this illness were kept from the crowd and were subject to examinations.

The fact that the swine flu affected humans whose livelihood does not include taking care of pigs is what made this illness noticeable by the public. It was taken that the infection of animals can also be acquired by humans but this unusual occurrence is considered a neon sign for this matter. The public records this trend on how these illnesses made a worldwide scare; question is whether they recognized how these ailments came about.