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For many New Yorkers, fear over the H1N1 bug, also known as swine flu, seems to have already run its course.

"I always think positively. I always wash my hands and I just don't worry about those things," said one local.

"I'm not worried about it all. Not to knock the media, but if it wasn't for the media we wouldn't even know what was happening," said another. "I start to worry when people start dropping on the floor in front of me - that's when I'd start worrying."

In his latest official flu update, even Mayor Michael Bloomberg commented on what he calls New Yorkers' tendency "to get on with it."

"I think it is fair to say there are fewer flu stories on radio, television and newspapers today than there were yesterday," said the mayor. "There are fewer calls to 311 than there were [before]. So perhaps we are focusing on the vice president and airplanes, other things."

But there still are many who have their fears, calling doctors' offices or heading to emergency rooms at any sign of a cough or a sniffle.

As concerns about H1N1 grew over the past week, doctors at St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital said they saw a nearly 40-percent increase in emergency room visits because of people who are worried they've been exposed to the virus. And they say that the number of worried patients still has not dropped.

"Our clinicians are just inundated with people here because they have viral symptoms and they want to know or they have no symptoms at all," said Dr. Gabe Wilson of St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital.

Of the increased patient load, St. Luke's has only seen one confirmed case of H1N1 at its uptown campus. Like all other cases reported so far in the city, it was mild and required no special treatment other than bed rest and plenty of fluids.

While images out of Mexico may look severe, the virus still doesn't seem to be acting any different from regular, seasonal flu in New York City.

"If you're having the same symptoms you've had at other times in your life [when] you might have developed a mild viral illness, there's nothing different you need to do," says Wilson. "It is not useful at all to know if this is swine flu. The treatment for you is going to be the same, just rest and hydration."

For more severe symptoms, like persistent vomiting and trouble breathing, it is best to seek medical care. But doctors also say the message about washing your hands to prevent germ spread can't be repeated enough, flu or no flu.