Just the Facts, Ma'am

I heard recently that the amount of information in the world doubles every two years. I don't know if this is true, but it seems possible.

Faced with this, people often have difficulty in sorting the wheat from the chaff. What matters? What's true? What information can I trust?

Fortunately, there's a great source of simple information about scientific matters, including health. Sense About Science doesn't claim to cover everything but it does have good and easy-to-read information about Bird Flu, Detox, MMR, Radiation (mobile phones) and many other topics.

Just click the picture above to have a read - and make sense of the information deluge.

Swine flu and beer

So here I am at home with swine flu.

It's not a lot of fun but it is also boring. On Friday we had tickets to see Jude Law in Hamlet. Sorry I missed you, Jude. On Saturday we had tickets to an Army concert. The Dearly Beloved wasn't going to waste the tickets so she took a friend instead of me. I mean, I could have died. Today we had tickets to RIAT, the best air show in the world. Gave them to some friends. At least it was their anniversary.

Today I bleared into consciousness mid-morning. By lunch time I was zonked so I fell asleep. When I woke up about 4 o'clock I saw England were in danger of winning the Test. So I thought I would watch. This would be more fun if we had furniture in the lounge. The furniture is being re-upholstered so I am sitting on a garden chair.

This swine flu was very badly timed.

Now, I am a even-tempered man so I can adjust.

All I need is a beer.

I don't feel up to getting one from the kitchen fridge. My Younger Son refuses to get me a beer unless I can find something on the Internet that says it's OK to have a beer with swine flu.

The first Google hit is titled "swine flu: is it safe to drink beer?" Answers include "Of course beer is safe. Alcohol kills all the germs. ", "Acidity and alcohol will kill any virus that tries to live in beer" and "NonPork based beer only". MYS does not give due credence to these. As a recent graduate he is filled with an undue sense of the importance of his fatuous opinion.

So I look on the National Health Service website.

The top hits for "swine flu beer" include "Cancer-of-the-breast female" "cancer-of-the-testicle" (which I assume is male), "Herceptin", "chemotherapy" and "menopause". Now I am truly worried.

Then I come across a site that says alcohol causes swine flu. Scary.

A beer would take the edge off.