Swine flu spreads to 36 US states - 286 confirmed cases

Washington - The swine flu virus spread to 36 US states with a total of 286 confirmed cases, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Monday.The daily update added another six states and 60 cases to Sunday's tally for the US.The report came as Mexico, the epicentre of the hither-to unknown influenza, started relaxing some of its restrictions and reduced its alert from red to orange. Restaurants, cafes, administrative offices and court buildings may re-open from Wednesday, provided that they respect certain health requirements.In the US, a number of schools remained closed, under a 14-day shut-down guideline from US health officials.The World Health Organization (WHO) in Switzerland has kept the global alarm level at 5, one step short of the declaration of a full epidemic, which would be level 6.Earlier Monday, the Geneva-based World Health Organization confirmed 1,025 officially reported cases of influenza A(H1N1) infection in 20 countries.Only Mexico and the US have reported any deaths. For Mexico, the death toll was 25, while for the US, it was one - a Mexican toddler who was treated and died at a Texas hospital. //DPA

Mexican health officials raise swine-flu deaths to 19

Mexico City - Mexican Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova have raised the number of confirmed swine-flu deaths to 19 after examining 1,303 cases.
Cordova said 14 women and five men had died from the H1N1 flu strain, with most of the victims aged between 20 and 40 years.
The announcement Saturday followed earlier warnings that Mexico's death toll could rise as more tests are carried out on the 159 people who have died recently in Mexico of various forms of the flu.
The only other country to report an H1N1 death is the United States with one out of 141 infections.
The other governments reporting infections, according to the World Health Organization, are Canada with 34, Spain with 13, Britain with eight, New Zealand and Germany with four each, Israel with two, and Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands and Switzerland, Hong Kong and South Korea with one each.
The flu outbreak is caused by a new strain that has genetic elements that come from three species - pigs, birds and humans.//dpa

Governments must act quickly to prevent flu threat
By The NationPublished on May 1, 2009

Asean countries are scheduled to meet in Thailand next week to discuss how to tackle the potentially deadly outbreak of swine flu. The preventive move is welcome, as the forum should provide an opportunity for the health ministers from the 10 members of Asean to unite in addressing the problem. Fortunately the outbreak of the virus has so far not been found in any Asean country. The topic of the meeting is very relevant for Asean, whose people can travel across the region easily. If the flu virus were found in any Asean country, it would certainly raise fears as to whether that country would be able to contain the outbreak within its borders.
The Asean cooperation plan should focus on public information and how to prevent the outbreak taking hold in the region - for the well-being of both the citizens and the economy of each country. The more developed Asean countries should assist the less-developed ones in providing sufficient measures and funds to prevent an outbreak.
For instance, the provision of thermal scanners to monitor the temperatures of people arriving in the region should be a priority. In addition, public education about how to prevent infection is also vital. Proper dissemination of information is essential to ensure that the public is sufficiently informed and does not panic at the prospect of a pandemic spreading to all countries.
So far, the Asean countries are believed to be free of the virus. But no one can be complacent, for the virus has already spread across continents. The public expects to see governments doing everything they can to prevent further cases of this virus. Indeed, Asean would be negligent if it did not take immediate measures to address this serious concern of its people.

Putting my own perspective.....

A lot of countries around the world took step to warn the public and contain rapid outbreak of swine flue, which has been confirmed or suspected in many of death and illness worldwide.
The world Health Organization raised its pandemic alert level from four to five, which means they have determined that the virus is capable of human to human transmission. In this moment, several nation have impose travel bans, and made plans to air traveler that present symptom of swine flu, such as high fever, coughing, running nose and sore throat…etc.
Many global flu experts have been trying to predict how dangerous the new swine flu strain will be, as it became obvious, because they might have had a little information about Mexico outbreak. It’s still unclear how many cases have already occurred in the month and how virus is going to be developed. Everyone knows what regular flu is, but, all H1N1 flu came from 1918 pandemic. The reason why the flu may work or may not work, however, from year to year, is due to mutations. Therefore, there’s no vaccine available for this current flu strain and automatically, this is making the fear that millions of people will die before a vaccine can be made.

Take a look now!! Here we stand….


As we knew, we have a new virus in the world that appears to be very dangerous between people, and possibly between swine and humans. It is, fortunately, treatable with the antiviral drugs, but it is resistant to the other major class of anti-flu drugs. It is still moving, and it’s uncertain situation that cannot be seen right now. We do not yet know how deadly this virus is: while Mexico has been able to track down the numbers of death people inH1N1 cases, it cannot determine just how many Mexicans have been infected with the virus since it started spreading there in late March.
And, now we are closely related H1N1 human virus around the world. Even though widespread, it is not unusually lethal. Last year this virus developed full resistance to flu. It would be most disturbing if the 2008 H1N1 human virus were to reassert with the new swine virus, as we are facing a more drug-resistant pandemic strain of influenza, treatable only with the drug which must need a good research.
Luckily, Mexico has shown the world how they have responsibility to respond this pandemic. By moving to shut down schools, entertainment and places of social congregation, Mexico has problem about economy crisis as well. They are facing financial consequences. But its dramatic actions may be saving Mexican lives, and slowing down the outbreak of 2009. In that sense, the world owes Mexico a big gracier.
Governments all over the world would do well to pay attention to Mexico's response, and learn from it. Throughout Asia, governments have been learning their old SARS-epidemic, and scanning people for evidence of fevers. That worked for SARS control because the SARS virus was almost absolutely dangerous when people were running fevers.
Amusingly, some governments are banning pork products from the Americas, as if it were possible to get the flu from eating a cooked sausage, actually, it is not.
We have created to feed meat to our human population. It is a strange world wherein billions of animals are concentrated into very small spaces, breeding stock is flown to production sites all over the world and poor migrant workers are exposed to infected animals. And it's going to get much worse, as the world is once poor populations of India and China divide the middle class. This is the ecology that, in the cases of pigs and chickens, is breeding influenza. It is an ecology that promotes viral evolution. And if we don't do something about it, this ecology will one day spread a severe pandemic that will be the same like 1918 pandemic situation.