Health officials assuring citizens of availability of swine flu medicines. Over the past weekend, mobile phone text messages were sent with the message that swine flu was in the country and had indeed already claimed 2 lives! One of the messages read thus, “Ministry of Health warning; to avoid swine flu which is suspected to be already in Uganda, you are advised not to eat pork or be near pigs for the time being. The first case [of swine flu] reported in Ggaba and Nakulabye. Send this message to 25 people and MTN will reward you with airtime.”
The government was quick to come out assuring everybody that the messages were sent out by a malicious person and were not true at all. Ggaba and Nakulabye, mentioned in the messages, are the best known pork joints around Kampala with most of restaurants offering pork of all sorts on their menus. MTN is the biggest telecommunications company in the country. The messages which was spreading just like the usual email forwards caused panic to the extent that legislators asked for a full explanation from the health officials.
Many people still believe that swine flu is associated with pigs and because of this, many still believe they can escape the virus as long as they do not get near pigs or eat pork. Non pork eaters have been suspected of being behind the messages especially religions that are against eating pork.
