Jacob Goldstein, WSJ, was the live bloggger for the WHO teleconference from 4 pm et to 457 pm et. The critical development was that the WHO (Director General Margaret Chan) has raised the worldwide pandemic alert level from Phase 4 to Phase 5. What does this mean?  "Going from phase 3 to phase 4 meant sustained human-to-human transmission. Five means we are early in the process of spreading from country to country. Phase six can mean we're later in that process of spreading to other countries."  This requires translation from opaque apparatchik speak. Phase 5 means "human-to-human contact" into at last two countries in one region. This has been true since Sunday 26, and so WHO is moving purposefully sluggishly. Phase 6 means "global pandemic with widespread outbreaks." This is also true right now -- though it does hinge upon the definition of the word "widespread."  It seems critical to note that there is no Phase 7. The puzzle remains why does the H1N1 appear much more severe in Mexico than elsewhere?   Time?  If this was war-fighting, it is time to come out of the bunkers and attack.  Establish thermal imaging at the airports connecting out of Mexico and the American Southwest, quarantine the exposed when practical, provide the anti-viral Tamiflu to all medical personnel (vectors for infection), close the likely exposed universities, schools, restaurants and movie theaters for a week at a time, discourage pork products.  I am describing Mexico City with a Singapore bonus.  At this rate, it could be San Diego, El Paso and San Antonio soon. It also seems significant to note that, following my colleague Henry Miller's teaching, there is no vaccine for this outbreak of A/H1N1 and not likely to be one for an indefinite future.  To my reading we cannot know if the Spanish fu of 1917-1918, also an A/H1N1, started in a similar slow smouldering fire and only later exploded.