Moving closer to top pandemic alert as Swine flue spreads globally

H1N1, or more popular called the Swine flue has spread from its original places North America and Mexico to Australia, Britain, Chile, Japan and Spain and has moved the world closer to the top pandemic alert, the World Health Organisation said on June 2nd 2009.

Keiji Fukuda, acting WHO assistant director-general told that we are at Phase 5 but are getting closer to Phase 6.

There are a signals that a number of countries that appear to be in transition, moving from travel-related cases to more established community types of spread. Some of these countries are the countries been followed for quite a while, but also include countries such as the UK and Spain in Europe, Japan in Asia, Chile in South America and also Australia.

According to the latest figures from WHO, the new influenza strain, also known as swine flu, has been found in 64 countries, and remains most prevalent in North America. WHO laboratories have confirmed nearly 19,000 infections including 117 people who have died.

Those figures might not show the full reach of the contagious disease that has afflicted young people more than normal seasonal flu, and has caused mainly mild symptoms as it has spread around the world.

WHO can not tell the full number of people who are infected across the entire spectrum and they expect that the future impact of this infection has yet to unfold.

The WHO is working on revamping its six-point pandemic scale so that the top alert reflects the severity of the flu and not just the geographical pattern of its spread.

WHO works on the idea to add a three-point severity scale within the highest marker, so that the overall level could reach 6 even if the flu’s symptoms remained moderate, and it could be adjusted later if it had more serious effects.

It is not enough just to say we are at a certain phase and that a virus has spread to a certain extent. That kind of announcement really has to be accompanied by some indication of what is the severity, and some guidance to countries on how they can modify their approaches to what is going on.

The latest country to report a case was done by the Health Ministry of Ukraine who reported that it is with 99 percent certainty that the first case of H1N1 flu was registered in Ukraine as of May 30th 2009.  An 24 years old Ukrainian who had spent two years in the United States returned to Ukraine a week ago was tested with symptoms. The case will be verified within two to three weeks. The man had been in contact with more than 70 people who were now under observation. None had reported any flu symptoms.