THERE IS, as yet, no evidence of community-level transmission of the new H1N1 flu virus in Europe, a senior World Health Organisation (WHO) expert has said.
Acting assistant director general Keiji Fukuda told a news briefing in Geneva that in the European countries with the most cases – Britain and Spain – the virus did not appear to be spreading beyond institutions such as schools to the wider community.
Five children attending the same school in London have been diagnosed with the influenza a (H1N1) virus. The number of cases in Britain now stands at 28, with about 300 people there waiting for test results.
Chief medical officer for England Sir Liam Donaldson told the BBC it was too early to assume the swine flu outbreak was a mild infection just because no one in the UK had died.
“We may see an apparent peak in the incidence over the next month or so, but that doesn’t mean it has gone away.”
Warning against complacency, he said: “We know that flu viruses can change their character very rapidly as they move through the population.”
In Dublin yesterday, Dr Tony Holohan, chief medical officer at the Department of Health, said Ireland was still dealing with one confirmed case of the virus and that no other probable cases had emerged.
He said Ireland would remain at alert level five, but if the pattern were to progress to sustained person to person transmission, particularly in the European Union, it could be increased to alert level six. “If that were to occur it wouldn’t necessarily surprise us and we would be prepared for that.”
Dr Holohan said increasing the alert level would not necessarily result in a significant rise in the number of cases in this country, but it would be a declaration of the status of the incident on a global basis.
He also called on the public not to become complacent about the potential spread of the virus.
Dr Kevin Kelleher, head of health protection at the Health Service Executive (HSE), said that more than two million posters and leaflets containing information about swine flu are to be distributed to houses and businesses across the country in the coming days.
He said the Irish person who contracted the virus was improving and that he was relatively well as of yesterday.
Dr Kelleher said that were a pandemic to develop, a plan to ensure hospitals could deal with the extra patients was in place.
“Ultimately, we would stop all nonessential care for that period. “We would have to carry on certain care, people would still get heart attacks and broken legs, but all non-essential care would be stopped for that time.”
Dr Holohan said business leaders and employers should be mindful that even a moderate number of cases in Ireland could have a substantial impact on absenteeism in workplaces. “People need to ensure they have adequate plans in place to deal with that eventuality.”
Meanwhile the US government is cautiously optimistic the H1N1 virus is milder than first thought, the newly confirmed health secretary, Kathleen Sibelius, said.
Dr Richard Besser, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concurred, saying: “So far the severity of the illness we are seeing in this country is similar to what we’re seeing with seasonal flu.”
There are in excess of 700 probable cases of the flu virus in 44 US states.
In Mexico, President Felipe Calderon said the country was over the worst of its epidemic. Mexican schools are to remain closed until May 11th.