Travel Weekly Blog

The world Health Organisation has declared swine flu (aka A(H1N1)) a pandemic.

We've been at threat level five for months, so what exactly does moving to level six change?

According to officials, not much for UK residents [Guardian]. Cases in England are more or less flat, though Scotland is seeing a bit of an increase.

But what about travellers? Says the Guardian's correspondent:

Swine flu in most countries has been mild and there have been no signs of it becoming more deadly. [...BUT...] Swine flu has to be officially designated a pandemic because it is spreading easily in two distinct regions, the Americas and now Australia.

Swine flu is now present in 74 countries [New York Times], so while there's little need to panic it would be wise to keep an eye on the destinations you specialise in.

How? Your go-to resource is obviously the World Health Organisation. Here's what to subscribe to and bookmark:

Feeds

• A(H1N1) RSS feed
• WHO on Twitter

Static content

• Cases by country [June 11] 
• Map of global cases [June 11] 
• Press briefing audio files
• A(H1N1) page

Further reading

Check the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's site for general and country-specific travel advice.

Travel Weekly has a swine flu coverage page, which has some archived news with a travel trade angle, plus some links to other news sources and background information.

Bad Science columnist Ben Goldacre wrote a good voice-of-reason piece about Swine Flu and the media back in late April

Forbes reports that today's news boosted pharmaceutical stocks - but quick checks on TUI Travel and Thomas Cook Group numbers [Yahoo Finance] suggest the big travel companies haven't taken a hit (so far?). 

...and you'll find heaven knows how many more articles on the pandemic announcment on Google News.

If you've found any other good resources, share them in the comments section.