We thought we had gotten past the worst of it, but it appears swine flu may be rearing its ugly head once again.

A surge in swine flu cases (known in more pig-friendly terms as H1N1) in Australia — the number of cases spiked by more than 1,000 on Monday, for a total of 1,211 — may cause the World Health Organization to soon declare the first flu pandemic since 1968. The virus is also spreading in Chile and the UK. Two American students came down with it in Cairo, Egypt, while the amphibious war ship, the USS Iwo Jima, reported 24 cases.

"We are getting really very close to knowing that we are in a pandemic situation," WHO influenza chief Keiji Fukuda said in Geneva.

But the worst thing that could happen if a pandemic is declared is mass panic. In an attempt to prevent that, the WHO is educating countries on how to prevent stampedes for face masks, or rushing to the hospital for every little cough or sniffle, among other knee-jerk reactions. After all, the regular seasonal flu kills thousands a year, and there’s no proof the swine version is more harmful than that. The WHO says 26,288 cases — including 140 fatal ones — have been reported in 73 countries. The latest death in the U.S. occurred in California today, when an Alameda County man with heart and metabolic problems succumbed to the virus, reports The San Francisco Chronicle.

Now go wash your hands! Click here for more tips and information on protecting yourself from the virus.