Quiet Sun = Impending Pandemic?

[lifterdead]

How about some internet gossip this lovely Sunday morning?


As some of you noticed, I recently posted a thread about the new record low in the sun's activity during this sunspot cycle. I've read elsewhere about pandemic flu outbreaks occurring after sun spot cycle peaks, but I've always taken them with a grain of salt.

Then I started reading about the new swine flu that's currently spreading around the world. (I'm most disturbed by the age group that seems to have the highest mortality rate; 25-45!)

(See below for more on H1N1 outbreak.)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8016909.stm

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/hscout/2009/04/26/hscout626462.html


I usually take these kinds of cause/correlation theories for what they are: imaginative BS. I was disturbed, however, to find a wide variety of journal articles related to sun spot cycles and flu epidemics.

http://www.journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/ymehy/article/PIIS0306987706002726/abstract






I'm still skeptical, of course. But how about it? New solar minimum, new flu pandemic? Could we see a repeat of the Spanish flu epidemic that killed millions in 1918?

 

[Zigurd]

Hmmm...

Well, I am sure that the Suns influence in our planet has not been discovered completely. Such a massive object as a Star will have a cascade of unusual results in us, but can we measure them and connect the dots ?

I don't think so. Not yet at least ;P