Consider as a blessing the archipelagic character of the Philippines. It’s a plus factor in the fight to contain and mitigate the spread of swine flu (renamed influenza-A H1N1 after an apparent protest by pigs).

Still, we have to wonder how we’re already in the midst of a pandemic when we don’t have an epidemic yet.

As little as what the experts know about the disease, that rural barangay in Jaen, Nueva Ecija that is now in a state of calamity defies the profile of a community infection.

As Health Undersecretary Mario Villaverde tells “Bulong Pulungan” at Sofitel hotel, life there is slow and quiet, it’s not an urban neighborhood where the people do much malling, traveling, or social interacting.

How it happened there is a riddle.

With 60 new cases (as of Wednesday) added to last week’s 93, it helps to know that:

With the rains, more people could catch the flu, seasonal or swine; Dust masks sold in drugstores work as a protective shield because the virus is not found in the air but in the droplets expelled by cough, sneezes, mucus, phlegm, saliva. No kissing? “Only your spouse,” said the doctor, sounding like a priest.

H1N1 is not your ordinary flu. It began “as a mix of swine flu, bird flu, and human flu,” and as it grows a “re-assortment” of viruses is to be expected.

The best antidote? Stay healthy and be scrupulous about personal hygiene. In other words, don’t be a pig