Russians immunizing themselves from swine flu?
The head of the Russian football supporters federation has recommended Russian fans drink lots of Welsh whiskey to ward off the H1N1 virus (better known as the swine flu virus) when the Russians play a World Cup qualifier against Wales in September. Although, it is not clear whether this recommendation would really alter the Russian drinking habits, except shift them from their usual vodka to whiskey. Telling Russians to drink copious amounts of booze is like telling a fish to swim, right?
One also wonders whether the drinking recommendations will cause an uptick in incidents surrounding the game. The Russians are a quite fervent group it would seem.
“Health officials say this virus is very dangerous but being a fan myself I can tell you that for a real fan nothing is more important than the well-being of the team,” said Shprygin, who also sits on the executive board of the Russian FA. “Russian fans don’t fear anything or anybody so this virus will not stand in our way of supporting our team.”
After reading that, all I can picture is a bunch of Russian fans attempting to breathe in all of the swine flu viruses in the air surrounding the team like tick birds protecting a rhinoceros.
Of note: It was nice of the Russians to encourage the fans to drink the local whiskey. Although, I suppose if they could get liquids on flights they would have just brought vodka.
Because drinking whisky has worked so well for the Scots in fighting Swine Flu.
I didn’t put this in the post but wanted to…it is just a stupid flu virus. Thousands of people die from the flu every year but nobody gets worked up about it. Why now? I mean, tens maybe hundreds of people have died. That certainly isn’t an epi/pandemic in my mind. People are weak. You get sick, you take care of yourself and you go to the doctor.
On the other hand, if a nice travel destination gets hit with a swine flu outbreak, it can make going there really cheap.