May 1--DECATUR -- Wash your hands. Wash your hands.
That can be the first cure in preventing so many of these pandemic diseases, especially the rapidly spreading swine flu, said Dr. Michael Greger, director of public health and animal agriculture with the Humane Society of the United States.
"This age of commercial global airline travel has aided to how rapid these viruses have spread around the world. I encourage people to step back and see how these viruses emerged in the first place. And confinement is not an option."
He said the last flu pandemic in 1918 killed 50 million to 100 million people around the world. A triple hybrid virus, part bird flu and a pig strand virus, also spread in the United States because of the conditions of pigs crammed into metal crates on a factory farm in North Carolina in 1998.
Greger has also written the book, "Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching."
This week, he has been on CNN, National Public Radio and other talk shows discussing the recent swine flu outbreak.
Because of all the media coverage, Greger who was scheduled to come to Decatur to speak over the weekend at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Church had to cancel.
However, the 2007 film documentary "King Corn" still will be shown Saturday as the last of the environmental film series sponsored by the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship.
In the film, two best friends from college, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, follow the corn trail across America's heartland. Critics have called it as relevant as "Super Size Me" and "An Inconvenient Truth."
Ellis said most of the corn grown in the U.S. is not grown to be eaten, but it's industrialized raw material that becomes high fructose corn syrup and feed for animals.
Mel Weinstein with the environmental film series committee at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, said the film won a Peabody Award and is a "must see" for all who live in corn country.
"As a teaser for the film, a 'King Corn' quiz slide presentation will be shown prior to the movie to test people's knowledge about corn production.
"Corn will be served � theater-style popcorn that is," Weinstein said.
sheilas@herald-review.com|421-7963
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