As well as checking the AV vendors to see if they know about the 'virus' in question, it is probably worth checking out
http://www.Vmyths.com/ , which lists virus hoaxes. Many of the AV vendors no longer send virus alerts because of the number of hoaxes. There are of course standard for avoiding virus exposure, ie never open an email (especially an attachment) from somebody you don't know (this is not 100% effective as your most trusted frien may be infected because they didn't have this policy); and always keep your AV software up to date (however it may take 2 weeks for the software company to provide defence against any individual virus by which time its already worldwide). The only 100% protection is to never download data/software into your computer (including via floppy) but this is impracticle to most people so the absolute advice remains:
make backups of any data you don't mind losing