How worried should you be about swine flu?

That’s the question of the hour for world health officials and the rest of us alike.

For decades, virologists have worried about exactly this nightmare scenario: a brand new influenza virus makes the leap from birds or pigs to human beings and then begins to spread freely from person to person. The imaginary nightmare would be even scarier if it began in one of the world’s densely-crowded megacities–a place like Mexico City, for example–where it could infect millions of people before anyone knew it even existed.

That’s exactly the sort of nightmare that seemed to be unfolding as swine flu emerged and began to spread.

The Ms.Fits crossed the finish line of the Live Healthy Iowa 100-day challenge in style, tallying up 44 hours and 45 minutes of physical activity in their final week. Overall, the team compiled a whopping 735 hours of activity and lost an average of a little more than 3 percent of their body weight. That number is all the more impressive since only about half of the Ms.Fits set out to lose weight. As is true in almost any program or study, weight loss varied considerably among participants. But even those who lost only modest amounts of weight, or ended at the same weight, crossed the finish line healthier and fitter than they were before. PDQhealth thanks the Ms.Fits for letting us follow their progress. Go Ms.Fits!

The Ms.Fits added another 52 hours 50 minutes of activity this week and the team lost another two pounds, as the Live Healthy Iowa Challenge begins the final lap. Bravo! Some of the team members have walked, some have cycled, some have done workouts at the gym, and others have exercised with Wii Fit–proving that there are many ways to become more active. The Ms.Fits have proved something just as important: forming a group can be a powerful motivator for almost any healthy lifestyle change.

It comes as no surprise. As the gloomy economic news mounts and more and more Americans find themselves unemployed or underemployed, stress is on the rise. The number of respondents who reported that the economy is causing significant stress jumped from 66 percent a year ago to 80 percent last September, according to the American Psychological Association. Calls to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline surged from 39,465 in January 2008 to 50,158 this past January.

In a recent New York Times poll, 70 percent of respondents worry that a member of their household will become jobless. A vast majority say they’re convinced the recession will last another year or more.

With the finish line of the Live Healthy Iowa Challenge firmly in sight, the Ms.Fits added another 48 hours and 40 minutes of activity this week. The team also dropped another three pounds. With spring arriving in the great state of Iowa, opportunities for getting out and exercising are growing week by week, so the Ms.Fits should have lots of new inspiration and motivation in the closing weeks of the challenge. We’re there on the sidelines to cheer our favorite team on. As far as we’re concerned, they’re already big winners. Go Ms.Fits!

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With just three weeks of the 100-day LIve Healthy Iowa challenge left, the Ms.Fits are definitely in their groove, tallying up 60.5 hours of activity this week. The team dropped one pound in all–two members were up, two members were down in weight. The fact that the Ms.Fits have been averaging about 6 hours of extra physical activity every week for each team member is reason to cheer. And their success is being duplicated throughout the state and around the country. Teams competing at the University of Iowa, for instance, have tallied almost 35,482 hours of activity since the competition began and lost a whopping 3,015 pounds!