I don't know about projected deaths of swine flu, but *regular flu* kills about 36,000 people yearly just in the US. 6000 people killed by swine flu so far *world wide*... Swine flu is shaping up to be the regular flu's kid brother who's not as smart or athletic but for some reason gets all the attention anyway.

the regular flu part isn't exactly accurate. 9/10s of regular flu deaths are deaths among people older than 65. Most times, they already have health problems that the flu makes worse. Think about what you go through when you get the flu. Regular influenza is taxing on the body. Younger, healthy people tend to just be miserably sick for a couple weeks, and then they recover. But with the elderly, it causes their underlying disease(s) to decompensate and they don't have the reserves to get through it. Whatever underlying disease they have may not be the direct cause listed on the death certificate, but it's a contributing factor. It's probably list as an indirect cause. Influenza alone rarely kills people. Influenza plus, plus, plus does. You may not know this, but there is a list of people who are supposed to get flu vaccines every year. The elderly are on that list and so is anyone with an underlying disease that could complicate the flu. And, their entire family--everyone they live with is supposed to get a shot too. It helps isolate the person, put them in a bubble. If no one they live with is likely to get the flu, they are less likely. And they are working on new standards too. Since it's shown that while children are not the most affected by the regular flu, they are the ones who carry it in their grimy little hands and get everyone (including grandma and grandpa over 65) sick. The difference between regular flu and swine flu is that the swine flu is killing the young. And while a relatively week strain hit the U.S., kids are still dying and 20-30% of them don't have an underlying disease or condition. They are dying of swine flu and swine flu alone. That's why people are panicking.

It is no different from this flu than any other flu. Thousands of children die each year from regular seasonal flu, in fact, in the years that they didn't have enough or made the wrong vaccine, there were just as many if not less deaths from flu.