My mother, who was visiting us over the Thanksgiving holiday, said that we would laugh about this year’s holiday in five years. After all, it’s not every year that one orders take out pizza on Thanksgiving. Or one’s daughter gets firsthand experience with the latest pandemic.
It started the Saturday before Thanksgiving when my daughter came down with a low grade fever. We didn’t think much of it, but we kept her inside nevertheless. That night, when her breathing seemed labored and her temperature spiked to 104 degrees, we were more concerned.
The next morning, when we took Elisa, listless and limp, to our neighborhood clinic, we dutifully put on the face mask recommended for those with a fever. The Canadian doctor on duty explained to us, in what seemed a spiel he must have repeated a hundred times, the facts about Swine Flu. He told us that 90% of the flu this year in Beijing was H1N1 and that this winter, Swine was synonymous with “the flu” – at least in China. He then enlightened us on what this meant.
Our doctor told us that now that the numbers have been tallied and statistics calculated, the mortality rate for H1N1 is no better or worse than any other flu, though it is slightly more contagious. He said that 20% of all people who contract it never even suffer an elevated temperature. It seems the media hype and early reports that led us all to believe that this was the next “big one,” a frightening follow up to the illness that killed millions in 1918-19, was a dress rehearsal. While this doesn’t mean that people won’t suffer – or even die – he told us that the statistics mirror those of other flu seasons.
The doctor successfully calmed down two nervous parents. Still, with the stigma attached to this flu, we felt hesitant to advertise our daughter’s plight, even as she quickly returned to her active self. I found myself telling people, as I realized I had been told by others, “Well, my daughter is suffering from a fever.” All of us, myself included, hesitant to use the dreaded “f” word.
While my daughter had rallied the day before Thanksgiving, enough for us to make dinner reservations at our favorite restaurant, which was offering a Thanksgiving special, she relapsed at the last moment, a normal temperature elevating once again to 101 degrees. We cancelled the reservation, ordered pizza, and watched Mad Men. A Thanksgiving to remember.