How to get reliable swine flu information online

May 6, 2009 By Etan Horowitz

With blogs, Facebook, Twitter and lots of other sources, information about swine flu is traveling at light speed.

But sometimes that information isn't confirmed before it's disseminated, which can lead to confusion and even outright errors.

Here are five sites that have good track records for providing reliable information.

1. Google Map of swine-flu cases

This map uses color-coded pins to denote both confirmed and probable cases of swine flu. You can use your mouse to move the map around and zoom in and out to see more detailed locations. tr.im/k6L4

2. CDC Emergency Twitter account

Get live updates on Twitter from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many of the messages have the location of confirmed cases as well as links to more information. twitter.com/CDCemergency

3. The World Health Organization's swine-flu resources

Includes updates, media briefings and helpful information. who.int/csr/disease/swineflu

4. The Centers for Disease Control's swine flu resources

Includes tips on what you can do to stay healthy, a chart showing confirmed cases, webcasts and videos. cdc.gov/swine flu

5. New York Times swine-flu map

A nice map with cases as well as detailed information about each of them. tr.im/k68h

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