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London —  Britain's Home Secretary, Alan Johnson, has confirmed the terrorist threat level in the U.K. has been downgraded from "Severe" to "Substantial."  That's the lowest level since just before the London bombings of 7/7 four years ago. Britain breaks down terrorism threats to one of five categories. Substantial is the middle one.

But no sooner does one door close on your fears than another opens.

The combined efforts of the Department of Health and the press have me shaking in my boots over swine flu.  Up to 65,000 deaths may be caused by H1N1 strain of influenza if worse comes to worse, one expert said last week, and that's all we've been reading about ever since.

And because we live in paranoid times you have to prepare yourself for the worst. I'm not alone in thinking that, btw. Two weeks ago, my wife ordered a super-duper thermometer off Amazon so we could monitor our body temps. They said it would ship in 24 hours ... now the site acknowledges they are completely out of stock and have no idea when they can fill our order.

The NHS is asking people who think they might have swine flu to phone to talk to their doctors rather than bring their germs into the the doctor's office.

This has turned into the summer of washing hands and germ awareness.

 

http://www.globalpost.com/notebook/united-kingdom/090720/breathing-easier-britain