Swine flu cannot be contained

[cheekyboy]

Deadly swine flu outbreak 'can't be contained'

 

 

The strain of swine flu is suspected of killing as many as 60 people in Mexico.

 

The strain of swine flu is suspected of killing as many as 60 people in Mexico. (Reuters: Jorge Dan Lopez)

 

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says an unusual new flu virus has spread widely and cannot be contained, as the World Health Organisation urges governments to be on the alert.

 

"It is clear that this is widespread," the CDC's Dr Anne Schuchat told reporters.

 

"And that is why we have let you know that we cannot contain the spread of this virus."

 

The strain of swine flu is suspected of killing as many as 60 people in Mexico and infecting thousands more.

 

It is a new strain, and therefore poorly understood. The World Health Organisation (WHO) says it does not know the full risk yet.

 

The organisation has held an emergency meeting to discuss the outbreak.

 

Its director-general, Margaret Chan, says the deadly new form is serious and does have pandemic potential.

 

"It has pandemic potential because it is infecting people," WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said in Geneva.

 

"However, we cannot say on the basis of currently available laboratory, epidemiological and clinical evidence whether or not it will indeed cause a pandemic."

 

The WHO is advising all countries to be vigilant for seasonally unusual flu or pneumonia like symptoms among their populations, particularly among young, healthy adults who seem to be the most affected in Mexico.

 

The CDC's acting director, Dr Richard Besser, says it seems humans are transmitting the virus.

 

"There are things that we see that suggest that containment is not very likely, in that we are seeing cases in Texas and we're seeing cases in San Diego without any connection between them, which makes us think that there's been transmission from person to person," he said.

 

The Mexican government says there will be a mass vaccination campaign, and in the meantime it has closed all schools and universities.

 

CDC officials are assisting public health authorities in Mexico to test additional specimens and providing epidemiological support as part of a WHO team.

 

The centres have also dispatched teams in southern California, where several cases were reported.

 

Health leaders in the US, Mexico, Canada and at the WHO say they are communicating frequently, and state and local US health authorities are conducting investigations.

 

There is no vaccine to protect humans from swine flu, only to protect pigs, according to the CDC.

 

Dr Schuchat says measures are being taken to produce a vaccine against the virus if necessary, but cautions that it usually takes "months" to produce a vaccine.

 

"We're not going to have large amounts of vaccine tomorrow," she warned.

 

- ABC/BBC/AFP/Reuters

[cheekyboy]

Sunday, May 10, 2009

 

Swine Flu case reported in Bangkok

 

PHUKET: The Public Health Ministry said yesterday it had detected a suspected first case of the deadly type A (H1N1) influenza in Thailand and is awaiting confirmation of the infection from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States. The result of the CDC's tests are expected within seven days.

 

No suspected cases of the type A (H1N1) virus have been found in Phuket or elsewhere in Thailand.

 

Public Health Minister Witthaya Kaewparadai told a press conference that monitoring by the Epidemiology Bureau in Bangkok had found 25 suspects from April 28 to Friday, most of whom had traveled to countries with outbreaks of the flu, and 15 of whom had been cleared. Ten remain in quarantine pending lab confirmation, he said.

 

One is suspected to have had A (H1N1), having returned from an outbreak country, but has recovered, Wittaya said. The ministry has already submitted that person's sample to the US CDC lab because Thailand has no sample of the A (H1N1) virus to compare with for confirmation, he said.

 

Declining to give details of the suspect, Wittaya affirmed that the ministry had everything under control with strict measures in place to prevent the virus spreading.

 

Chulalongkorn University virologist Yong Poovorawan applauded the ministry's submission of the sample to the CDC, as this was Thailand's first suspected case.

 

Dr Rungrueng Kitphati, chief of the Medical Science Department's International Health Regulation Coordination Centre, noted that samples had been sent abroad in the same way during the Sars and bird-flu scares.

 

The Thai Disease Control Department's spokesman, Dr Kamnuan Ungchusak, said the patient's samples had been sent to the US on Thursday evening.

 

The patient, who was well informed about the situation, had a fever on arrival in Thailand and had taken the antiviral drug Oseltamivir for five days until recovering, he added.

 

The ministry has been screening arrivals, especially from Mexico, the US, Canada, Spain and the UK, at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport since April 27. By Friday it had screened 404,134 passengers.

 

Monitoring of arrivals by air continues, with detection scanners out in force at Bangkok, Phuket and Chiangmai airports. Scanners have ordered and will soon be in place at land borders nationwide.

 

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