Well our beloved Edmonton Oilers looked like a disease ridden whore last night, didn’t they? Merely watching the game gave us a mild case of the swine flu right through the TV we believe. We have no idea what has made this team go from hero to zero in such a short amount of time but judging by the state of near hysteria the MSM is in, it has something to do with the H1N1 virus and the likelihood that we are all minutes away from death.

The NHL disclosed yesterday that Avalanche Goaltender Peter Budaj had come down with the Swine Flu. Not to be outdone by the opposition going into a divisional match, the Oilers cryptically released post game on some news stations that one of their players too had come down with the H1N1 virus.

True to form, two separate stations reported that Oilers would not say which player was ill. Also true to form the Oilers brass let it slip to other stations, who immediately broke the news that the affected player was Ladislav Smid. Through an improbable series of circumstances we actually saw Smid yesterday and we can report that he looks remarkably unconcerned about contracting “the killer flu” – and perhaps the rest of us unwashed masses should take a page out of his book and dial down the hysteria.

Yes, the Oilers haven’t scored in two games. Yes, they look slower than a tier-9 Pee Wee hockey team. Yes, that game last night was so boring that our roommate was heard to remark “Man alive, this game is extraordinarily boring.” But we are going to give them the benefit of the doubt and chalk this stretch up to being under the weather. Not the killer flu that has caused people to stand in a tightly packed line up outside medical clinics in Edmonton for up to six hours mind you – just the flu that we all so often jeer at year after year.

Besides, it’s not like a more virulent strain of a flu could wreak havoc on the Oilers, could it? Flying around North America together, being exposed to the germs carried by the population of a half dozen cities in the past week. Tightly packed onto a bench, sharing water bottles and the occasional smooch. No, this doesn’t sound like a breeding ground for disease to us.

If we were Pat Quinn, we would have each player hermetically sealed in an oxygen chamber à la Michael Jackson in the 1980s. Then we would transport the Oilers around using forklifts – precious cargo remaining safe and healthy inside. We would have Sparky Kulchisky and Ken Lowe line the oxygen chambers up on the bench and we would simply press the eject button on whatever player we wanted on the ice at any given time. The merchandising spin-offs of a branded Oilers anti H1N1 chamber would be immense at this time of borderline panic among the wussier segments of the population, easily swayed by newscasters looking to rile us up.

Like much of our news we heard this second hand from a buddy who we will classify as “reliable.” Apparently there was a swine flu epidemic in the ’70s in the US much like the one we are facing today. Newscasters and papers fanned the flames of panic and Americans dutifully lined up for vaccinations.

Problem? The Americans manufactured a bunk vaccine that killed more people than the flu itself did. But the medical community has advanced miles since then, pioneering technologies in many industries and now achieve incredible feats like a non lethal flu vaccination and making a 50-old-woman look like a spry 21 year old? Ain’t that right Madonna?

No thanks. We aren’t quite ready to put our faith in western medicine.

Quite yet.

Don’t want Swine Flu? Simple answer: don’t eat pork. Right, Gregor?

Totally.