Via Focus Information Agency: A/H1N1 death toll in Greece reaches 60, 350,000 got flu vaccine.
A/H1N1 death toll in Greece reached 60, Greek Ta Nea newspaper reports. A 57-year-old man with complex illness is the latest victim of the new flu virus.
According to experts, the pandemic wave in Greece is getting weaker but a second and third wave of the flu are not excluded in late winter and early spring.
Around 350,000 people already got a flu vaccine.
Via NetIndian.in: Swine flu toll in India jumps to 878. Excerpt:
The death toll due to influenza A (H1N1) in India has jumped to 878, with as many as 34 more deaths being reported from different parts of the country, an official statement said here today.
Seven of the deaths — four in Maharashtra, two in Gujarat and one in Delhi — were reported during the day, while information on as many as 27 others deaths that occurred earlier have now been conveyed by the authorities of the states concerned to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
According to the statement, these included 20 deaths in Gujarat, 4 in Punjab, 2 in Rajasthan and 1 in Madhya Pradesh.
Of the total swine flu deaths in the country so far, Maharashtra now accounts for 256, while 132 lives have been lost in Rajasthan, 131 in Karnataka, 86 in Gujarat, 67 in Delhi, 52 in Andhra Pradesh, 31 each in Kerala and Haryana, 29 in Punjab, 10 in Uttarakhand, 9 in Uttar Pradesh, 8 in Madhya Pradesh, 7 in Tamil Nadu, 6 in Puducherry, 5 each in Chandigarh, Goa and Himachal Pradesh, 3 in Orissa, 2 each in Jammu & Kashmir and Chhattisgarh and 1 in Mizoram.
The Press Information Bureau’s December 26 H1N1 update confirms the 878 deaths.
Via Wales Online: Another swine flu death in Wales brings toll to 28. Excerpt:
Another person has died in Wales in the last week after contracting swine flu.
There have now been 28 swine flu-related deaths in Wales, including 29-year-old David Hayes, who died while on holiday in Spain.
Across the UK, 299 people with swine flu have died since the start of the pandemic, including 203 in England, 55 in Scotland and 14 in Northern Ireland. The majority had underlying health conditions.
The latest figures show that the number of people with swine flu is continuing to fall – on December 23 there were 645 people with flu-like symptoms in Wales.
Via Xinhua: A/H1N1 flue cases reach 737 in Tanzania. Excerpt:
Positive A/H1N1 flue cases in Tanzania have reached 737 since the first case was reported in early July this year, Tanzanian senior medical official said.
Out of the above cases, 45 are fresh and quarantined at a special camp in Mwanza Region in northwest Tanzania, the Tanzanian Sunday News quoted Chief Medical Officer Deogratius Mtasiwa as saying.
Mtasiwa said the fresh patients are all inmates at Butimba Prison, who are under close monitoring and medical care.
The latest development has come hardly a month after the disease broke out in Kwimba District also in Mwanza last month where 40 patients were quarantined, following the reports in which142 people were suspected of being infected.
Following the dangerous situation in the area, the Tanzanian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare has taken several measures to contain the situation, including the closure of Ilula Primary School in Kwimba District where some students and teachers got infected, the chief medical officer said.
He added that the situation is back to normal in Kwimba and that the inmates at Butimba prison are not at risk of further infections following the quarantining of the positive cases.
Via Xinhua: Nepal records first A/H1N1 flu death. Excerpt:
Nepal on Sunday confirmed its first death due to A/H1N1 infection.
The deceased, 50, whose name has not been disclosed yet, died Sunday morning while undergoing treatment at the Bir Hospital in Kathmandu.
According to Professor Dr Vijaya Sharma, the A/H1N1 virus victim died due to pneumonia complication.
The deceased was also undergoing treatment for his intestine related disease.
Earlier, an A/H1N1 flu infected patient was kept in ventilator due to complex problem with his lungs. But he was completely recovered later.
Via Thaindian News: First swine flu death in Assam. Assam is a state in India’s far northeast. Excerpt:
A 21-year-old college student Sunday died of swine flu, the first fatality to the deadly H1N1 virus in Assam, an official said.
A health department spokesperson said the girl student, Shikha Biswas, was declared dead early Sunday by doctors at the Guwahati Medical College Hospital.
“She was at the hospital for the past 13 days after she tested H1N1 positive. Her condition deteriorated suddenly and she died early Sunday,” a doctor at the medical college said.
Shikha was a college student in Jagiroad, 56 km east of here.
More than 70 people tested H1N1 positive in Assam during the past four months, although the number of people currently battling with the virus is just five.
Via the Bangkok Post: Old diseases never die, they just relapse. Excerpt:
As Thailand faces the new threat from an influenza pandemic, old foes such as bird flu, cholera and dengue fever are threatening to make a comeback, experts warned.
As of Dec 23, there were 29,886 confirmed case of type-A H1N1 flu and 191 deaths.
“No bird flu death case [for a long time] doesn’t mean the virus has disappeared,” said Pasakorn Akarasevi, director of the Bureau of Epidemiology.
In Thailand, 17 of 25 confirmed bird flu victims died between 2004 and 2006. Although there has been no confirmed human case since 2006, bird flu is still circulating among poultry populations.
Ten provinces, including Sukhothai in the lower North, which was once declared a red zone of the virus outbreak, also reported bird flu infections early this month.
“Continuing reports of avian flu cases in Egypt as well as the latest human death in Cambodia and Vietnam’s Dien Bien Phu town are a warning sign that the virus is still around and could strike any time without a well-planned surveillance system and cooperation between health and livestock officials as well as local communities,” he said.
It was crucial to follow the national strategic and surveillance plan on bird flu in both humans and poultry to ensure that the virus would not claim more lives, he added.
Apart from bird flu, Mr Pasakorn believes dengue fever will flare in urban areas. Vector-borne disease outbreaks, particularly among adults, will become a big issue next year in densely populated cities and municipal areas.
Dengue has spread nationwide, mostly in central provinces, with 50,132 cases and 42 deaths as of Dec 12.
There may also be a rise in chikungunya fever, caused by garden-striped mosquitoes, said Kamnuan Ungchusak of the Disease Control Department. Asia is regarded the epicentre of the re-emergence of the disease.
Via The Observer, virology professor John Oxford talks about 2009 in review: swine flu. Excerpt:
My greatest fear is that the virus will mutate next year, to enable it to infect older people. If it does, then the death rate next year will be much worse than this, perhaps even as high as the winter of 1999-2000.
Remember that between a third and a half of all people who have ended up in intensive care with swine flu were previously completely well; they weren’t asthmatics or on chemotherapy. While the pandemic has been fairly mild here, I think it will kill off for ever the notion (among doctors and the public alike) around influenza that “Oh, it’s only flu”.
I hope that will be swine flu’s lasting legacy.
Via Global Voices Online, a fascinating post by Ayesha Saldanha: Palestine: Swine Flu Arrives In Gaza. Excerpt:
The H1N1 influenza virus reached the Gaza Strip much later than it did other places, a fact attributed to the blockade imposed upon its population by both Israel and Egypt. The first death from H1N1 was announced earlier this month. In this post, bloggers in Gaza report on the fears and reactions of the population regarding swine flu – and on the rocketing sales of the spice believed to prevent it.
By all means read her whole post.
I’ve been vaguely aware of this possible new flu drug, but didn’t post about it. Npw Revere has, and it’s the must-read for the day: A new front line drug for flu in the offing?