swineflu

Schools are opening in Pakistan tomorrow after summer vacations. All the countries in the region and in the world are taking measures to protect and safegaurd the youth by at least informing them about the precautions against swine flu. Pakistanis, it seems are living in isloation and ignorance.

Parents please take protective measures.

(The News) Sunday, August 30, 2009
PARIS: Swine flu spreads four times faster than other viruses and 40 per cent of the fatalities are young adults in good health, the world’s top health official warned in an interview appearing Saturday.

“This virus travels at an unbelievable, almost unheard of speed,” World Health Organisation Director General Margaret Chan told France’s Le Monde daily in an interview.

“In six weeks it travels the same distance that other viruses take six months to cover,” Chan said.

“Sixty percent of the deaths cover those who have underlying health problems,” Chan said. “This means that 40 percent of the fatalities concern young adults — in good health — who die of a viral fever in five to seven days.

“This is the most worrying fact,” she said, adding that “up to 30 percent of people in densely populated countries risked getting infected.”

Chan’s warning came a day after the WHO said the virus had overtaken others to become the most prevalent flu strain.

“Evidence from multiple outbreak sites demonstrates that the A(H1N1) pandemic virus has rapidly established itself and is now the dominant influenza strain in most parts of the world,” the UN agency said in a statement.

“The pandemic will persist in the coming months as the virus continues to move through susceptible populations,” it added. Chan underlined that emergency and healthcare services in several countries had come under strain and stressed that resources allocated for cancer patients and those suffering from heart disease should not be diverted.

“One must not rob Peter to pay Paul,” she said. “All governments must prepare for the worst.”

She said the most important thing in the battle against the virus was “political leadership.”

More than 2,180 people around the world have died from the virus since it emerged in April, according to the latest WHO figures.

Chan also said that it could be months before sufficient vaccine is available to combat the pandemic.

She put world production capacity at 900 million doses a year, for a global population of 6.8 billion people.

Even if this was an unprecedented effort, and authorities were speeding up procedures for getting vaccines to the market, there should be no question of compromises on their safety and effectiveness, Chan said. Britain and France received their first batches of swine flu vaccine this week. Australia on Friday said a massive swine flu vaccination programme would start in October and Turkey hopes the first supplies of the vaccine will come by that time.

While 90 percent of severe and fatal cases occur in people aged above 65 in seasonal flu, most of those who die from swine flu are under the age of 50.

A “very severe form of disease” affecting the lungs and causing severe respiratory failure among young and healthy people was being reported, WHO said Friday, adding that highly specialised care was required.

Technorati Tags: H1N1, precaution for swine flu, SWINE FLU

A company spokesman confirmed that Google has announced two-day holiday for all its employees at the office here to enable them undergo screening for Influenza A(H1N1).

Over 1,000 employees of the firm were told to contact the Andhra Pradesh Chest Hospital after one employee was tested positive for the swine flu.

He was among the six employees of three IT companies who contracted the virus from a software engineer, who returned to the city from Houston on July 5, according to health authorities.

The 29-year-old techie, who approached the Chest Hospital on July 11 after he developed swine flu symptoms, spread the infection to employees of the IT companies with whom he worked.

The techie and six others were tested positive on Monday, spreading the swine flu scare in IT companies in Madhapur in Hyderabad. Employees of one company have already started taking medicines as a precautionary measure.

Health authorities said the swine flu symptoms in the techie could not be detected despite compulsory screening of all air passengers at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad. This was the first cluster formation in the city.

With eight new cases including a two-and-half-year-old boy who arrived in Hyderabad from Dubai, the swine flu cases in the city has gone up to 31.

Courtesy- HT News

Technorati Tags: google, H1N1, hyderabad, india, swine flu in india