Canada-wide, the death rate in confirmed H1N1 cases per capita in each province has an 88-percent correlation with the number of pigs per farm in that province (the bigger the pig farms, the higher the death rate) and an 89-percent correlation with the ratio of pigs to people in the province.

Also worrisome are trends among new cases. The number of new confirmed cases since July 3 in each province has a 97-percent correlation with the number of pigs in the province.

H1N1 rates have a much weaker relationship with poultry and cattle farming. Although a small correlation exists with H1N1 in some cases, especially with poultry operations, it is, on balance, more than twice as high for pig farms. In B.C., H1N1 rates actually tend to have a negative correlation with cattle farming (meaning the more cattle or dairy farms, the fewer flu cases there generally are in a region).