On the Eurostar on monday I noticed an oriental couple a few rows behind me sitting there with surgical masks covering their faces.  Arriving at Paris’ Gare du Nord station on Monday I was greeted with large signs – about two metres tall – with headlines about swine flu, or whatever they were calling it; grippe porcine I think it was.  They reminded me a bit of the huge, scary rabies posters we used to have all over ports.Going down some stairs in a metro station on Tuesday I saw another oriental couple with surgical masks on.  It may have been the same couple – it is hard to tell with the faces covered – but I think they were different.  (Different colour masks).

Returning to Britain I saw a small poster – A4 perhaps. No more than A3 – about the flu.  Very re-assuring in a way.  The scale of the French posters made it all seem imminent, while the British ones had a sense of just going through the motions.  I imagine (hope) it is a bit different at airports where people are arriving from Mexico and the US.

I travelled back on the train to Crawley, safe in my sense of false security, and arrived home to find that there are rumours of a couple of suspected swine flu cases in Broadfield, involving some people who recently returned from the US.  Don’t know if it is true, or where the rumours started, but worrying if true.