Thursday, June 11, 2009 - 18:40
Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, official spokesman of the Ministry of Health on the No. 12 hit with the swine flu Egyptian child a U.S. citizen at the age of one and a half years, was coming from the state of Minnesota for the U.S. through London on British Airways, and arrived at Cairo International Airport on 7 June, accompanied by his mother.
وأضاف المتحدث الرسمى فى بيان عن وزارة الصحة أنه قد لوحظ أثناء متابعة الطفل وأسرته بمحل إقامتهم بالإسكندرية من قبل الفريق الوقائى ظهور عليه أعراض الاحتقان بالحلق والرشح، على الفور تم نقله إلى مستشفى بالإسكندرية وإعطائه عقار التاميفلوا وحالته الصحية مستقرة.
His official spokesman said in a statement by the Ministry of Health, it was observed during the follow-up to the child and his family's place of residence in Alexandria by the emergence of the Prevention Team throat symptoms of congestion and cold, were immediately transferred to a hospital in Alexandria, and to give drug Altammivloa and stable condition.
وأوضح أنه تم أخذ عينات من المخالطين للطفل وهم الأخ والجد والجدة والعاملة وإرسالها للمعامل المركزية لتحليلها والتأكيد من خلوها من المرض.
He has been taking samples from contacts of the child they are brother and grandfather and grandmother, and labor and sent to the central laboratories for analysis and confirmation is free of the disease.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Egypt: Ministry of Health denied the closure of the subway
Thursday, June 11, 2009 - 16:19
Caption: Health denied the closure of the subway and imposes a blackout on its plan in the face of swine flu
Denied, Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, spokesman of the Ministry of Health, today, Thursday, again cited some websites stop flights from the MRT or reduce the number of subway users, to ensure that the spread of swine flu after the discovery of cases of the disease, and access to the case of 11 Based on the recommendations of the Ministry of Health, pointed out that the current situation of the disease in Egypt does not requires the taking of any action as a special alarm that called for easy treatment of the disease.
وأوضح شاهين أن ما يجب علينا فعله الآن كمواطنين هو الاهتمام بوسائل النظافة العامة من أجل تفادى الإصابة بالعدوى سواء للشخص نفسه أو للآخرين، وذلك لمنع أى اتصال مباشر بين الأشخاص كالمعانقة والمصافحة ولمس الوجه، وفى حالة عدم وضع قناع واق يتم الاحتفاظ قدر الإمكان بمسافة مترين على الأقل بين كل شخص وآخر، والتباعد بين الأشخاص وعدم التواجد فى مناطق الزحام وعملية التهوية الجيدة للأماكن المغلقة.
Shaheen said that what we must do now as citizens is through attention to hygiene to avoid infection, whether the person himself or to others, so as to prevent any direct contact between persons Kalmaangp her, shaking hands and touching the face, if not set mask are maintained as much as possible to a distance of two meters least of all one person and another, and the distance between the people and lack of presence in the areas of crowding and the process of good ventilation of the premises closed.
وقال إنه بالرغم من ظهور 11 حالة مصابة بالمرض فى مصر الآن، إلا أن هذه الحالات جميعا قادمة من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية ولا توجد أى حالات إصابة بين المصريين المقيمين داخل البلاد.
He said that despite the emergence of 11 cases infected with the disease in Egypt, but all of these cases coming from the United States and there have been no cases of Egyptians who reside within the country.
وذكر الدكتور عبد الرحمن شاهين أن إجراءات الحجر الصحى بجميع منافذ الجمهورية تنفذ بصورة مشددة..
According to Dr. Abdel-Rahman Shaheen, said that the quarantine procedures in all ports Republic implemented tight ..
موضحا أن من أسباب عدم اكتشاف الحالتين أثناء ساعة الوصول هو عدم ظهور أى أعراض عليهما، لأنهما كانا فى فترة حضانة المرض التى قد تستغرق نحو أسبوعا.
He pointed out that the reasons for the lack of detection of cases during the hours of access is the absence of any symptoms of them, because they were in the incubation period, which may take some weeks.
يأتى نفى الصحة فى الوقت الذى يخيم التعتيم على خطتها فى مواجهة أنفلونزا الخنازير وتحجيم انتشاره وكأن خطة الوزارة سرية، ولا يجوز أن يطلع عليها الجهات الشعبية، وذلك بالرغم من تحذير المتخصصين والأطباء من استمرار حركة المترو الطبيعية، وعدم اتخاذ إجراءات وقائية بالمناطق التى تشهد تجمعات كبيرة كدور السينما والمسارح والملاعب ووسائل المواصلات الأخرى.
Denied health comes at a time camped out to cover up the plan in the face of swine flu and limit the spread and if the secret plan of the ministry, may not be disclosed to those roots, despite a warning from the specialists and doctors from the natural movement of the subway, and not to take preventive action in areas undergoing large concentrations the role of cinema and theaters, stadiums and other means of transportation.
Caption: Health denied the closure of the subway and imposes a blackout on its plan in the face of swine flu
Denied, Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, spokesman of the Ministry of Health, today, Thursday, again cited some websites stop flights from the MRT or reduce the number of subway users, to ensure that the spread of swine flu after the discovery of cases of the disease, and access to the case of 11 Based on the recommendations of the Ministry of Health, pointed out that the current situation of the disease in Egypt does not requires the taking of any action as a special alarm that called for easy treatment of the disease.
وأوضح شاهين أن ما يجب علينا فعله الآن كمواطنين هو الاهتمام بوسائل النظافة العامة من أجل تفادى الإصابة بالعدوى سواء للشخص نفسه أو للآخرين، وذلك لمنع أى اتصال مباشر بين الأشخاص كالمعانقة والمصافحة ولمس الوجه، وفى حالة عدم وضع قناع واق يتم الاحتفاظ قدر الإمكان بمسافة مترين على الأقل بين كل شخص وآخر، والتباعد بين الأشخاص وعدم التواجد فى مناطق الزحام وعملية التهوية الجيدة للأماكن المغلقة.
Shaheen said that what we must do now as citizens is through attention to hygiene to avoid infection, whether the person himself or to others, so as to prevent any direct contact between persons Kalmaangp her, shaking hands and touching the face, if not set mask are maintained as much as possible to a distance of two meters least of all one person and another, and the distance between the people and lack of presence in the areas of crowding and the process of good ventilation of the premises closed.
وقال إنه بالرغم من ظهور 11 حالة مصابة بالمرض فى مصر الآن، إلا أن هذه الحالات جميعا قادمة من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية ولا توجد أى حالات إصابة بين المصريين المقيمين داخل البلاد.
He said that despite the emergence of 11 cases infected with the disease in Egypt, but all of these cases coming from the United States and there have been no cases of Egyptians who reside within the country.
وذكر الدكتور عبد الرحمن شاهين أن إجراءات الحجر الصحى بجميع منافذ الجمهورية تنفذ بصورة مشددة..
According to Dr. Abdel-Rahman Shaheen, said that the quarantine procedures in all ports Republic implemented tight ..
موضحا أن من أسباب عدم اكتشاف الحالتين أثناء ساعة الوصول هو عدم ظهور أى أعراض عليهما، لأنهما كانا فى فترة حضانة المرض التى قد تستغرق نحو أسبوعا.
He pointed out that the reasons for the lack of detection of cases during the hours of access is the absence of any symptoms of them, because they were in the incubation period, which may take some weeks.
يأتى نفى الصحة فى الوقت الذى يخيم التعتيم على خطتها فى مواجهة أنفلونزا الخنازير وتحجيم انتشاره وكأن خطة الوزارة سرية، ولا يجوز أن يطلع عليها الجهات الشعبية، وذلك بالرغم من تحذير المتخصصين والأطباء من استمرار حركة المترو الطبيعية، وعدم اتخاذ إجراءات وقائية بالمناطق التى تشهد تجمعات كبيرة كدور السينما والمسارح والملاعب ووسائل المواصلات الأخرى.
Denied health comes at a time camped out to cover up the plan in the face of swine flu and limit the spread and if the secret plan of the ministry, may not be disclosed to those roots, despite a warning from the specialists and doctors from the natural movement of the subway, and not to take preventive action in areas undergoing large concentrations the role of cinema and theaters, stadiums and other means of transportation.
Egypt: 3 people detained on suspicion of bird flu in Minya
Detained hospital fevers Minya, Beni Mazar-3 infected persons on suspicion of bird flu after being exposed to very high temperature and shortness of breath.
أعلن الدكتور أيمن رجب وكيل وزارة الصحة بالمنيا أنه تم احتجاز كل من نادية صبره عيسى (40 سنة) نزلة العمودين من سملوط، وقاصد كريم على السيد (59 سنة) ابو هلال المنيا بمستشفى حميات المنيا، كما استقبل مستشفى حميات بنى مزار ناهد صالح سعد (22 سنة) منشية جلال بنى مزار.
Dr. Ayman Ragab, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health and queens had been detained by the patience Nadia Issa (40 years) of Smleut bad columns, and bound to Mr. Karim (59 years) Abu Hilal El Minya hospital fevers, also received hospital fevers shrine built Nahed Saleh Saad ( 22 years old) Manshiyat Jalal shrine built.
تم أخذ عينات لفحصها فى المعامل المركزية للتأكد من نتيجة العينة وقامت المستشفيات بحجزهم وعمل الإسعافات اللازمة لهم. Samples were taken for examination in the central laboratories to ensure sample and Bhdzhm hospitals and the work of aid they need.
أعلن الدكتور أيمن رجب وكيل وزارة الصحة بالمنيا أنه تم احتجاز كل من نادية صبره عيسى (40 سنة) نزلة العمودين من سملوط، وقاصد كريم على السيد (59 سنة) ابو هلال المنيا بمستشفى حميات المنيا، كما استقبل مستشفى حميات بنى مزار ناهد صالح سعد (22 سنة) منشية جلال بنى مزار.
Dr. Ayman Ragab, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health and queens had been detained by the patience Nadia Issa (40 years) of Smleut bad columns, and bound to Mr. Karim (59 years) Abu Hilal El Minya hospital fevers, also received hospital fevers shrine built Nahed Saleh Saad ( 22 years old) Manshiyat Jalal shrine built.
تم أخذ عينات لفحصها فى المعامل المركزية للتأكد من نتيجة العينة وقامت المستشفيات بحجزهم وعمل الإسعافات اللازمة لهم. Samples were taken for examination in the central laboratories to ensure sample and Bhdzhm hospitals and the work of aid they need.
Egypt: Confirmed that the epidemic as a pandemic .. Raise the swine flu warning for the maximum degr
Thursday, June 11, 2009 - 17:16
The World Health Organization and the swine flu pandemic, and informed the Member States and up to 193 countries to lift the state of preparedness to the sixth grade.
يأتى ذلك بعد أن اختتم خبراء من منظمة الصحة العالمية اجتماعا طارئا اليوم، الخميس، فى مقر المنظمة فى جنيف بحثوا فيه انتشار المرض فى أنحاء العالم ورفعوا توصية بإعلان حالة الوباء وذلك للمرة الأولى منذ نحو 41 عاما.
This came after the conclusion of experts from the World Health Organization held an emergency meeting today, Thursday, at the organization's headquarters in Geneva, discussed the spread of disease around the world and raised the recommendation to declare a state of the epidemic and for the first time in nearly 41 years.
وجاء ذلك بعد انتشار حالات الإصابة بالمرض فى 74 دولة بالأمريكتين وأوروبا وأستراليا وآسيا والشرق الأوسط أخرها كانت مصر التى وصل عدد الحالات فيها إلى 11 حالة مؤكدة حتى الآن، ليصل إجمالى عدد الحالات المكتشفة فى أنحاء العالم كله إلى نحو 28 ألفا فى ظل تصنيف الوباء أن انتقال الفيروس بين البشر أصبح منتشرا فى إقليمين على الأقل من العالم.
This came after the incidence of the disease in 74 countries of Europe and the Americas, Asia, Australia and the Middle East, Egypt was the most recent of which arrived in the number of cases to 11 confirmed cases so far, bringing the total number of cases detected throughout the world to about 28 people under the classification of the epidemic that the transition the virus among humans has become widespread in at least two of the world.
وفى تطور سريع لملاحقة مرض أنفلونزا الخنازير فى القاهرة قرر المكتب الإقليمى لمنظمة الصحة العالمية عقد مؤتمر صحفى موسع بالتعاون مع وزارة الصحة المصرية مساء اليوم الخميس، فى تمام الساعة الـ8 لبحث مستجدات الوضع فى مصر التى سوف تعلنها مساء اليوم المديرة العامة لمنظمة الصحة العالمية بشأن أنفلونزا (AH1N1)
In a related development, the rapid pursuit of bird flu in pigs Cairo regional office has decided to the World Health Organization held a press conference expanded in cooperation with the Ministry of Health in Egypt on Thursday evening, at 8 pm to discuss the latest developments in Egypt, which will be announced Sunday evening the Director-General of the World Health Organization on influenza ( AH1N1)
The World Health Organization and the swine flu pandemic, and informed the Member States and up to 193 countries to lift the state of preparedness to the sixth grade.
يأتى ذلك بعد أن اختتم خبراء من منظمة الصحة العالمية اجتماعا طارئا اليوم، الخميس، فى مقر المنظمة فى جنيف بحثوا فيه انتشار المرض فى أنحاء العالم ورفعوا توصية بإعلان حالة الوباء وذلك للمرة الأولى منذ نحو 41 عاما.
This came after the conclusion of experts from the World Health Organization held an emergency meeting today, Thursday, at the organization's headquarters in Geneva, discussed the spread of disease around the world and raised the recommendation to declare a state of the epidemic and for the first time in nearly 41 years.
وجاء ذلك بعد انتشار حالات الإصابة بالمرض فى 74 دولة بالأمريكتين وأوروبا وأستراليا وآسيا والشرق الأوسط أخرها كانت مصر التى وصل عدد الحالات فيها إلى 11 حالة مؤكدة حتى الآن، ليصل إجمالى عدد الحالات المكتشفة فى أنحاء العالم كله إلى نحو 28 ألفا فى ظل تصنيف الوباء أن انتقال الفيروس بين البشر أصبح منتشرا فى إقليمين على الأقل من العالم.
This came after the incidence of the disease in 74 countries of Europe and the Americas, Asia, Australia and the Middle East, Egypt was the most recent of which arrived in the number of cases to 11 confirmed cases so far, bringing the total number of cases detected throughout the world to about 28 people under the classification of the epidemic that the transition the virus among humans has become widespread in at least two of the world.
وفى تطور سريع لملاحقة مرض أنفلونزا الخنازير فى القاهرة قرر المكتب الإقليمى لمنظمة الصحة العالمية عقد مؤتمر صحفى موسع بالتعاون مع وزارة الصحة المصرية مساء اليوم الخميس، فى تمام الساعة الـ8 لبحث مستجدات الوضع فى مصر التى سوف تعلنها مساء اليوم المديرة العامة لمنظمة الصحة العالمية بشأن أنفلونزا (AH1N1)
In a related development, the rapid pursuit of bird flu in pigs Cairo regional office has decided to the World Health Organization held a press conference expanded in cooperation with the Ministry of Health in Egypt on Thursday evening, at 8 pm to discuss the latest developments in Egypt, which will be announced Sunday evening the Director-General of the World Health Organization on influenza ( AH1N1)
WHO: Swine flu pandemic has begun, 1st in 41 years
Jun 11, 10:32 AM EDT
GENEVA (AP) -- The World Health Organization told its member nations it was declaring a swine flu pandemic Thursday - the first global flu epidemic in 41 years - as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.
In a statement sent to member countries, WHO said it decided to raise the pandemic warning level from phase 5 to 6 - its highest alert - after holding an emergency meeting on swine flu with its experts.
The long-awaited pandemic decision is scientific confirmation that a new flu virus has emerged and is quickly circling the globe. It will trigger drugmakers to speed up production of a swine flu vaccine and prompt governments to devote more money toward efforts to contain the virus.
"At this early stage, the pandemic can be characterized globally as being moderate in severity," WHO said in the statement, urging nations not to close borders or restrict travel and trade. "(We) remain in close dialogue with influenza vaccine manufacturers."
On Wednesday, WHO said 74 countries had reported nearly 27,737 cases of swine flu, including 141 deaths.
The agency has stressed that most cases are mild and require no treatment, but the fear is that a rash of new infections could overwhelm hospitals and health authorities - especially in poorer countries.
Still, about half of the people who have died from swine flu were previously young and healthy - people who are not usually susceptible to flu.
Swine flu is also continuing to spread during the start of summer in the northern hemisphere. Normally, flu viruses disappear with warm weather, but swine flu is proving to be resilient.
The last pandemic - the Hong Kong flu of 1968 - killed about 1 million people. Ordinary flu kills about 250,000 to 500,000 people each year.
Many health experts say WHO's pandemic declaration could have come weeks earlier but the agency became bogged down by politics. In May, several countries urged WHO not to declare a pandemic, fearing it would cause social and economic turmoil.
"This is WHO finally catching up with the facts," said Michael Osterholm, a flu expert at the University of Minnesota who has advised the U.S. government on pandemic preparations.
Despite WHO's hopes, raising the epidemic alert to the highest level will almost certainly spark some panic about spread of swine flu.
Fear has already gripped Argentina, where thousands of people worried about swine flu flooded into hospitals this week, bringing emergency health services in the capital of Buenos Aires to the brink of collapse. Last month, a bus arriving in Argentina from Chile was stoned by people who thought a passenger on it had swine flu. Chile has the most swine flu cases in South America.
In Hong Kong on Thursday, the government ordered all kindergartens and primary schools closed for two weeks after a dozen students tested positive for swine flu - a move that some flu experts would consider an overreaction.
In the United States, where there have been more than 13,000 cases and at least 27 deaths from swine flu, officials at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the move would not change how the U.S. tackled swine flu.
"Our actions in the past month have been as if there was a pandemic in this country," Glen Nowak, a CDC spokesman, said Thursday.
The U.S. government has already taken steps like increasing availability of flu-fighting medicines and authorizing $1 billion for the development of a new vaccine against the novel virus. In addition, new cases seem to be declining in many parts of the country, U.S. health officials say, as North America moves out of its traditional winter flu season.
Still, Osterholm said the declaration was a wake-up call for the world.
"I think a lot of people think we're done with swine flu, but you can't fall asleep at the wheel," he said. "We don't know what's going to happen in the next 6 to 12 months."
WHO likely to declare flu pandemic Thursday
25 minutes ago
GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization held an emergency swine flu meeting Thursday and was likely to declare the first flu pandemic in 41 years as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.
Health officials from Scotland, Indonesia and Thailand said the agency would declare a swine flu pandemic — a global epidemic — on Thursday after a teleconference with leading flu experts. Officials at U.N. missions in Geneva also said they expected the imminent announcement of a pandemic.
WHO spokesman Thomas Abraham said only that the emergency meeting began at noon in Geneva and WHO member nations would be informed of the result. WHO Director-General Margaret Chan was holding a press conference at 6 p.m. (1600 GMT, noon EDT).
"It is likely in light of sustained community transmission in countries outside of North America — most notably in Australia — that level 6 will be declared," Scotland's Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon told Scottish lawmakers, adding it would be Thursday.
Indonesian health minister Siti Fadilah Supari said she had been notified by WHO that "today will be declared to be phase 6."
Phase 6 is WHO's highest alert level and means that a swine flu pandemic is under way. The last pandemic — the Hong Kong flu of 1968 — killed about 1 million people. Ordinary flu kills about 250,000 to 500,000 people each year.
Since the new flu strain — dubbed A(H1N1) — first emerged in Mexico and the United States in April, it has spread to 74 countries around the globe. On Wednesday, WHO reported 27,737 cases including 141 deaths. The agency has stressed that most cases are mild and require no treatment, but the fear is that a rash of new infections could overwhelm hospitals and health authorities — especially in poorer countries.
The long-awaited pandemic announcement is scientific confirmation that a new flu virus has emerged and is quickly circling the globe. It will trigger drugmakers to speed up production of a swine flu vaccine and prompt governments to devote more money to containing the virus.
In May, several countries urged WHO not to declare a pandemic, fearing it would spark mass panic.
Fear has already gripped Argentina, where so many people worried about swine flu flooded into hospitals this week that emergency health services in the capital have collapsed. Last month, a bus arriving in Argentina from Chile was stoned by people who thought a passenger on it had swine flu. Chile has the most swine flu cases in South America.
In Hong Kong, the government on Thursday ordered all kindergartens and primary schools closed for two weeks after a dozen students tested positive for swine flu.
In Australia, swine flu cases jumped to more than 1,000 on Monday and reached 1,260 by late Wednesday.
WHO says its pandemic announcement would not mean the situation was worsening, since no mutations have been detected in the virus to show it is getting more deadly.
In Edinburgh, Sturgeon told lawmakers that a WHO announcement means countries should immediately activate their pandemic plans.
"A move to level 6 is not a verdict on the severity of the virus," she said. "It simply means that the extent of global spread now fulfills the definition of a pandemic."
Associated Press writers Maria Cheng and Jill Lawless in London, Dikky Sinn in Hong Kong, Vincente L. Panetta in Buenos Aires and Bradley S. Klapper in Geneva contributed to this report.
hat-tip Niman
GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization held an emergency swine flu meeting Thursday and was likely to declare the first flu pandemic in 41 years as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.
Health officials from Scotland, Indonesia and Thailand said the agency would declare a swine flu pandemic — a global epidemic — on Thursday after a teleconference with leading flu experts. Officials at U.N. missions in Geneva also said they expected the imminent announcement of a pandemic.
WHO spokesman Thomas Abraham said only that the emergency meeting began at noon in Geneva and WHO member nations would be informed of the result. WHO Director-General Margaret Chan was holding a press conference at 6 p.m. (1600 GMT, noon EDT).
"It is likely in light of sustained community transmission in countries outside of North America — most notably in Australia — that level 6 will be declared," Scotland's Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon told Scottish lawmakers, adding it would be Thursday.
Indonesian health minister Siti Fadilah Supari said she had been notified by WHO that "today will be declared to be phase 6."
Phase 6 is WHO's highest alert level and means that a swine flu pandemic is under way. The last pandemic — the Hong Kong flu of 1968 — killed about 1 million people. Ordinary flu kills about 250,000 to 500,000 people each year.
Since the new flu strain — dubbed A(H1N1) — first emerged in Mexico and the United States in April, it has spread to 74 countries around the globe. On Wednesday, WHO reported 27,737 cases including 141 deaths. The agency has stressed that most cases are mild and require no treatment, but the fear is that a rash of new infections could overwhelm hospitals and health authorities — especially in poorer countries.
The long-awaited pandemic announcement is scientific confirmation that a new flu virus has emerged and is quickly circling the globe. It will trigger drugmakers to speed up production of a swine flu vaccine and prompt governments to devote more money to containing the virus.
In May, several countries urged WHO not to declare a pandemic, fearing it would spark mass panic.
Fear has already gripped Argentina, where so many people worried about swine flu flooded into hospitals this week that emergency health services in the capital have collapsed. Last month, a bus arriving in Argentina from Chile was stoned by people who thought a passenger on it had swine flu. Chile has the most swine flu cases in South America.
In Hong Kong, the government on Thursday ordered all kindergartens and primary schools closed for two weeks after a dozen students tested positive for swine flu.
In Australia, swine flu cases jumped to more than 1,000 on Monday and reached 1,260 by late Wednesday.
WHO says its pandemic announcement would not mean the situation was worsening, since no mutations have been detected in the virus to show it is getting more deadly.
In Edinburgh, Sturgeon told lawmakers that a WHO announcement means countries should immediately activate their pandemic plans.
"A move to level 6 is not a verdict on the severity of the virus," she said. "It simply means that the extent of global spread now fulfills the definition of a pandemic."
Associated Press writers Maria Cheng and Jill Lawless in London, Dikky Sinn in Hong Kong, Vincente L. Panetta in Buenos Aires and Bradley S. Klapper in Geneva contributed to this report.
hat-tip Niman
Egypt: The detention of two NUWEBIAH hospital with suspected bird flu pigs
[This is Swine Flu. I will not be keeping records of suspected case in this Gov.]
June 11, 2009
Dr. Adel Alsafory NUWEBIAH hospital director-general of the Central Governorate of South Sinai, two have been detained in hospital, for the suspicion of bird flu pigs.
وقال الدكتور الصافورى، فى تصريح صحفى له اليوم الخميس، "إن الحالتين لسيدة ألمانية وزوجها المصرى"، مشيرا إلى أنه تم أخذ العينات منهما لفحصهما بالمعامل المركزية بالقاهرة.
Said Dr. Alsafory, in a press statement on Thursday, "The case of a German woman and her husband, the Egyptian", pointing out that the sampling test their central labs in Cairo. وأضاف أن المصرى هو صاحب مخيم سياحى بمدينة نويبع ويدعى محمد ميشو وزوجته كاترينا ميشو.
He added that Egypt is a tourist camp in the town of Nuweiba, Mohammed and his wife Katrina Michaud Michaud.
June 11, 2009
Dr. Adel Alsafory NUWEBIAH hospital director-general of the Central Governorate of South Sinai, two have been detained in hospital, for the suspicion of bird flu pigs.
وقال الدكتور الصافورى، فى تصريح صحفى له اليوم الخميس، "إن الحالتين لسيدة ألمانية وزوجها المصرى"، مشيرا إلى أنه تم أخذ العينات منهما لفحصهما بالمعامل المركزية بالقاهرة.
Said Dr. Alsafory, in a press statement on Thursday, "The case of a German woman and her husband, the Egyptian", pointing out that the sampling test their central labs in Cairo. وأضاف أن المصرى هو صاحب مخيم سياحى بمدينة نويبع ويدعى محمد ميشو وزوجته كاترينا ميشو.
He added that Egypt is a tourist camp in the town of Nuweiba, Mohammed and his wife Katrina Michaud Michaud.
"Health" announces flu infection of 11 pigs [Swine Flu/H1N1]
Thursday, June 11, 2009
أعلنت وزارة الصحة عن إصابة جديدة بأنفلونزا الخنازير لزوجة المهندس الذى يعمل بإحدى شركات البترول بالقاهرة، والذى أعلن عن إصابته أمس، الأربعاء، وهى كولومبية الجنسية وتبلغ من العمر 43 عاما، وكانت قادمة مع زوجها المصاب من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية يوم 7 يونيو الجارى.
The Ministry of Health of new infections of swine flu engineer's wife, who works in one of oil companies in Cairo, which he announced yesterday, Wednesday, the Colombian nationality, is a 43-year-old, was arriving with her husband, who the United States of America on 7 June.
هذا، وقد أكد عبد الرحمن شاهين المتحدث الرسمى باسم وزارة الصحة، أنها تعالج حاليا بمستشفى صدر العباسية وحالتها الصحية مستقرة، وبذلك يرتفع عدد الحالات المصابة إلى 11 حالة مصابة.
This was confirmed by the spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahin, official spokesman of the Ministry of Health, was being treated as a hospital and released Abbasiyah in stable condition, bringing the number of reported cases to 11 cases reported.
وأضاف شاهين أنه تم فحص جميع المخالطين لمهندس البترول وعددهم 20 شخصا، وجاءت النتائج المعملية سلبية للإصابة بفيروس الوباء العالمى ah1n1 المعروف بأنفلونزا الخنازير.
Shaheen added that screening of all contacts for the petroleum engineer, and the 20 people, and laboratory results were negative for infection by the global epidemic of avian ah1n1 known as pigs.
أما على مستوى منافذ الحجر الصحى على مستوى الجمهورية، فقد تم فحص خمس حالات مشتبه بإصابتهم بالمرض لمواطنين قادمين من الخارج من الكويت وأبو ظبى وتشيكوسلوفاكيا والدنمارك، وجاءت النتائج سلبية. The outlets at the level of quarantine at the level of the Republic, had been examined five cases suspected to have caught the virus from overseas nationals from Kuwait and Abu Dhabi, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, and the results were negative.
أما بالنسبة لحالات الاشتباه للمصريين المقيمين داخل جمهورية مصر العربية، فقد تم فحص 152 حالة اشتباه بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير بمحافظات القاهرة والبحر الأحمر وجنوب سيناء والدقهلية ودمياط والجيزة والشرقية والمنوفية وقنا، وجاءت جميع النتائج المعملية سلبية للإصابة.
As for the suspected cases of Egyptians living in the Arab Republic of Egypt, has been examined 152 suspected flu cases are still pigs and the Red Sea and South Sinai, Dakahliya, Damietta and Giza and Eastern Monoufia, Qena, and laboratory results were all negative for infection.
وعلى الجانب الآخر، تم فحص 58 حالة اشتباه بمرض أنفلونزا الطيور فى 14 محافظة، وهى لحالات مخالطة للطيور وجاءت جميعها سلبية.
On the other hand, was examined 58 suspected case of bird flu in 14 provinces, is to cases of contact with the birds and all came negative.
Egypt: Swine Flu, the wife of the injured bird in Alexandria, he denies
Thursday, June 11, 2009 - 12:01
caption: Is absent from the diagnostic accuracy of cases of infected swine flu?
Denied the wife of pigs infected with avian influenza is carried by the media of the injured husband, who returned from America, but that was the phenomenon of cold symptoms, so they decided to work for the analysis to check for Evajioa detained in hospital under the pretext of infected swine flu, and he ruled out the disease once and did not find any justification for his detention.
ومن ناحية أخرى رفعت إدارة الحجر الصحى بمستشفى حميات الإسكندرية درجة التأهب القصوى مع ظهور أول حالة اشتباه بالإصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير على المواطن ماجد محمد محمد (45 سنة) إثر عودته من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية بعد أن أفرجت عنه إدارة الحجر الصحى بمطار القاهرة أمس الأول، الثلاثاء.
On the other hand, the management of the quarantine hospital fevers Alexandria maximum degree of preparedness with the emergence of the first suspected case of disease, swine flu citizen Mohammed Majed Mohammed (45 years) following his return from the United States after being released by the Department of quarantine at Cairo airport on Monday, Tuesday .
صرح بذلك هشام الدخس مدير المستشفى والذى أشار إلى استقرار الحالة مع عمل الاحتياطات الأمنية اللازمة لمنع انتشار العدوى للآخرين ووضعه فى وحدة الفيروسات بقسم العلاج المميز فى ظل المتابعة المستمرة لحالته وتناوله لعقار التامفلو وبعض المضادات الحيوية مع مراعاة استخدام الماسكات الواقية ومنع الزيارة عنه نهائياً.
This was stated by Hisham Aldechs director of the hospital, which referred to the stabilization of the situation with the work of the security precautions necessary to prevent the spread of the infection to others and put a virus in the Department of distinctive treatment under the follow-up of his condition and his treatment of drug Altamflo and some antibiotics, taking into account the use of protective and prevent Almascat visit him once and for all.
caption: Is absent from the diagnostic accuracy of cases of infected swine flu?
Denied the wife of pigs infected with avian influenza is carried by the media of the injured husband, who returned from America, but that was the phenomenon of cold symptoms, so they decided to work for the analysis to check for Evajioa detained in hospital under the pretext of infected swine flu, and he ruled out the disease once and did not find any justification for his detention.
ومن ناحية أخرى رفعت إدارة الحجر الصحى بمستشفى حميات الإسكندرية درجة التأهب القصوى مع ظهور أول حالة اشتباه بالإصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير على المواطن ماجد محمد محمد (45 سنة) إثر عودته من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية بعد أن أفرجت عنه إدارة الحجر الصحى بمطار القاهرة أمس الأول، الثلاثاء.
On the other hand, the management of the quarantine hospital fevers Alexandria maximum degree of preparedness with the emergence of the first suspected case of disease, swine flu citizen Mohammed Majed Mohammed (45 years) following his return from the United States after being released by the Department of quarantine at Cairo airport on Monday, Tuesday .
صرح بذلك هشام الدخس مدير المستشفى والذى أشار إلى استقرار الحالة مع عمل الاحتياطات الأمنية اللازمة لمنع انتشار العدوى للآخرين ووضعه فى وحدة الفيروسات بقسم العلاج المميز فى ظل المتابعة المستمرة لحالته وتناوله لعقار التامفلو وبعض المضادات الحيوية مع مراعاة استخدام الماسكات الواقية ومنع الزيارة عنه نهائياً.
This was stated by Hisham Aldechs director of the hospital, which referred to the stabilization of the situation with the work of the security precautions necessary to prevent the spread of the infection to others and put a virus in the Department of distinctive treatment under the follow-up of his condition and his treatment of drug Altamflo and some antibiotics, taking into account the use of protective and prevent Almascat visit him once and for all.
The Ministry of Health: the incidence of disease, swine flu in the Cairo and Alexandria stable
June 10, 2009
Excerpt:
Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, official spokesman of the Ministry of Health on behalf of the stability of the two new cases announced today the discovery of HIV infected with A (H 1, 1), known as swine flu. Sahin said that the first case of an engineer working for an oil company in Cairo, and was suffering from symptoms of influenza after coming from the United States on June 7 of this, and began suffering from symptoms on 9 of the same month, a hospital being treated for chest بالعباسية and is in stable condition.
He added that the second case, an Egyptian citizen, a resident of the United States of America, arrived on June 4, began suffering from the symptoms of influenza on June 8 this, and that he went to a doctor protections Alexandria Hospital, who Pthoulih to the hospital on suspicion of being infected with the virus have been confirmed as a result of tests sent to labs central Cairo and is in stable condition.
-snip-
Excerpt:
Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, official spokesman of the Ministry of Health on behalf of the stability of the two new cases announced today the discovery of HIV infected with A (H 1, 1), known as swine flu. Sahin said that the first case of an engineer working for an oil company in Cairo, and was suffering from symptoms of influenza after coming from the United States on June 7 of this, and began suffering from symptoms on 9 of the same month, a hospital being treated for chest بالعباسية and is in stable condition.
He added that the second case, an Egyptian citizen, a resident of the United States of America, arrived on June 4, began suffering from the symptoms of influenza on June 8 this, and that he went to a doctor protections Alexandria Hospital, who Pthoulih to the hospital on suspicion of being infected with the virus have been confirmed as a result of tests sent to labs central Cairo and is in stable condition.
-snip-
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Map of Gulf of Suez Petroleum in Maadi area with 9 susp. cases of H1N1
Thanks to a reader, who helped me with this location.
The other hand, Dr. Ihab Abdalhafez, a doctor resident company in the Gulf of Suez Petroleum Maadi, about the presence of 9 suspected cases of HIV infection within the company,
وقال عبدالحافظ لـ«المصرى اليوم»: «جميع الحالات تم نقلها فوراً من مقر الشركة أمس، إلى مستشفى حميات العباسية»، مشيراً إلى أن الحالة الأولى لأحد الأمريكيين العاملين بالشركة ويدعى «إيلى أندور».
The Abdalhafez l «Egyptian today»: «All the cases were transferred immediately from the company's headquarters yesterday, admitted to hospital in Abbasiyah», pointing out that the situation of one of the first American employees of the company, named «Eli Andorra».
http://pandemicinformationnews.blogspot.com/2009/06/strikes-swine-flu-will-continue-in.html
HCM City confirms three more super flu cases
| HCM City confirms three more super flu cases | ||
| 16:59' 10/06/2009 (GMT+7) | ||
VietNamNet Bridge – Health officials in HCM City reported the number of confirmed A (H1N1) flu infection cases has risen to 17 yesterday, June 9, three more cases than the previous day.
Another case is a seven-year-old boy, who was also in quarantine after his first blood test gave positive result for the virus, and the second test will give result today, according to Phan Van Nghiem, head of HCM City Department of Health's Medicine Profession Division. The boy who lives in District 3, HCM City had not gone to foreign countries recently and had close contact with two A/H1N1 flu confirmed patients quarantined at HCM City Children's Hospital No 2. All of the three patients are in good health state. The city health workers yesterday also quarantined eight travellers with high body temperature at HCM City Tropical Diseases Hospital and HCM City Children's Hospital No 1. Nghiem said Pham Ngoc Thach Tuberculosis Hospital's quarantine rooms were put into operation yesterday, after receiving four travellers with high body temperature found at Tan Son Nhat Airport. Vaccine research Vietnamese and foreign experts will this week begin research aimed at producing a vaccine against the A/H1N1 flu virus, a seminar heard in Ha Noi on Monday. World Health Organisation officials told the seminar held by the Ministry of Health, WHO, and the US embassy on producing the vaccine that their agency would provide virus samples for the research. Dr Jean Marc Olive, head of WHO representative office in Viet Nam, pledged that they would support the country in producing vaccine against influenza A (H1N1) as well as other kind of flu. Tran Thanh Duong, deputy head of the Ministry's Preventive Medicine and Environment Department, warned of a possible epidemic outbreak in the country since more and more people were arriving from epidemic zones. Nguyen Thi Thu Van, head of the Vaccine and Bio-Technology Products Company No 1, said her company had begun research for making a vaccine. The company would receive H1N1 virus samples from foreign companies. She said it would take two years to make the vaccine in Viet Nam. The country is in the final stage of a trial to make a vaccine against the H5N1 strain of bird flu, according to Van. |
Egypt: Suspected Swine Flu & Bird Flu in same Village
From my Suspected & Confirmed list, and also my Suspected Cluster List...
Gharbiyah Gov.
Mahallah
June 7 http://tinyurl.com/lnk6f7
Swine Flu
Rauf Ibrahim (50 years) and
Badr Abdul Rahim Ibrahim (36 years) Badr Halawa Center Smonod
Suspected Bird Flu
June 10 http://tinyurl.com/med746
Mohamed Mahmoud Attia Farag (3) from the village of Mit Badr Halawa,
Gharbiyah Gov.
Mahallah
June 7 http://tinyurl.com/lnk6f7
Swine Flu
Rauf Ibrahim (50 years) and
Badr Abdul Rahim Ibrahim (36 years) Badr Halawa Center Smonod
Suspected Bird Flu
June 10 http://tinyurl.com/med746
Mohamed Mahmoud Attia Farag (3) from the village of Mit Badr Halawa,
5 new cases of detention on suspicion of bird flu meeting Sunday attended by
Wednesday, June 10, 2009 - 19:43
Detained hospital admitted Tanta and Mahala, 5 new cases of suspected infected with bird flu after feeling the high temperature, and pain of the bones and the lack of breathing, where he was admitted Mahala, Mohamed Mahmoud Attia Farag (3 years) from the village of Mit Badr Halawa, Ahmad Fawzi Ragab Elnaggar (two ) of the dead Sheikh Qtor Center, Yousef Mohammed Khalaf Allah Ramadan (27 years) from the village of Mahala Alsjaip Center, Abid Issam Tawfiq decimal (10 years).
كما احتجز حميات طنطا، كمال ماهر السيد فودة (عامان) من نواج مركز طنطا، تم حجز الحالات بالأماكن المخصصة لذلك وأخذ عينة دم ومسحة حلق وإرسالها للمعامل المركزية الخاصة بوزارة الصحة للتأكد من مدى إصابتهم بالمرض من عدمه. Tanta fevers have also been detained, Mr. Maher Kamal Fouda (two years) are having the status of Tanta, has been reserved for cases where the taking of a blood sample and swab hours and sent to the central laboratories of the Ministry of Health to ascertain the extent of illness or not.
صرح بذلك الدكتور شريف حمودة وكيل وزارة الصحة بالغربية. This was stated by Dr. Sharif Hammouda Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health meeting Sunday attended.
Detained hospital admitted Tanta and Mahala, 5 new cases of suspected infected with bird flu after feeling the high temperature, and pain of the bones and the lack of breathing, where he was admitted Mahala, Mohamed Mahmoud Attia Farag (3 years) from the village of Mit Badr Halawa, Ahmad Fawzi Ragab Elnaggar (two ) of the dead Sheikh Qtor Center, Yousef Mohammed Khalaf Allah Ramadan (27 years) from the village of Mahala Alsjaip Center, Abid Issam Tawfiq decimal (10 years).
كما احتجز حميات طنطا، كمال ماهر السيد فودة (عامان) من نواج مركز طنطا، تم حجز الحالات بالأماكن المخصصة لذلك وأخذ عينة دم ومسحة حلق وإرسالها للمعامل المركزية الخاصة بوزارة الصحة للتأكد من مدى إصابتهم بالمرض من عدمه. Tanta fevers have also been detained, Mr. Maher Kamal Fouda (two years) are having the status of Tanta, has been reserved for cases where the taking of a blood sample and swab hours and sent to the central laboratories of the Ministry of Health to ascertain the extent of illness or not.
صرح بذلك الدكتور شريف حمودة وكيل وزارة الصحة بالغربية. This was stated by Dr. Sharif Hammouda Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health meeting Sunday attended.
Development of 59 pigs suspected case of bird under observation meeting Sunday attended by
Wednesday, June 10, 2009 - 19:51
Established the Directorate of Health and the Department of Preventive Medicine, 59 new cases arriving from America, France, Italy, Japan, Turkey, Oman, Qatar and the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, under medical observation and continuous monitoring of the arrival of the affected countries for a period of ten days are the contacts for them.
وقال د.شريف حمودة وكيل وزارة الصحة بالغربية، إن إدارة الطب الوقائى قامت بفحص العائدين وإجراء الكشف الطبى على العائدين من الخارج، بعد أن استقبلت مديرية الصحة بالغربية كشفا بأسماء المصريين العائدين من الدول الأوربية وأمريكا والدول العربية والتى تنتشر بها الإصابة بالمرض، والتنبيه عليهم بالتوجه لأقرب مستشفى حميات أو صدر فى حالة ظهور أى أعراض عليهم أو على المخالطين لهم.
D said. Sharif Hammouda Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health meeting Sunday attended by the Department of Preventive Medicine has examined the returns and a medical examination on returning from abroad, after having received a meeting Sunday attended by the Directorate of Health revealed the names of Egyptians returning from European countries, America and Arab countries that are infected by the disease, and warned them to go admitted to the nearest hospital or released in the event of any symptoms or to contact them.
Established the Directorate of Health and the Department of Preventive Medicine, 59 new cases arriving from America, France, Italy, Japan, Turkey, Oman, Qatar and the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, under medical observation and continuous monitoring of the arrival of the affected countries for a period of ten days are the contacts for them.
وقال د.شريف حمودة وكيل وزارة الصحة بالغربية، إن إدارة الطب الوقائى قامت بفحص العائدين وإجراء الكشف الطبى على العائدين من الخارج، بعد أن استقبلت مديرية الصحة بالغربية كشفا بأسماء المصريين العائدين من الدول الأوربية وأمريكا والدول العربية والتى تنتشر بها الإصابة بالمرض، والتنبيه عليهم بالتوجه لأقرب مستشفى حميات أو صدر فى حالة ظهور أى أعراض عليهم أو على المخالطين لهم.
D said. Sharif Hammouda Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health meeting Sunday attended by the Department of Preventive Medicine has examined the returns and a medical examination on returning from abroad, after having received a meeting Sunday attended by the Directorate of Health revealed the names of Egyptians returning from European countries, America and Arab countries that are infected by the disease, and warned them to go admitted to the nearest hospital or released in the event of any symptoms or to contact them.
Egypt: Two new .. The swine flu alarm bells ringing
Wednesday, June 10, 2009 - 17:46
حالة من القلق، تعيشها الحكومة والمواطنون، بعد الإعلان عن ضبط حالتى إصابة جديدتين بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير، وخروج المرض عن سيطرة وزارة الصحة..
Of concern of the government and citizens, after the announcement of the control cases of the deadly new disease, swine flu and the disease out of the control of the Ministry of Health ..
مما أربك كافة قطاعات الدولة، وسط احتمالات بتحول أنفلونزا الخنازير إلى وباء.
Overwhelming all sectors of the state, amid expectations that the transformation of the swine flu epidemic.
وفيما أعلنت "الصحة" ارتفاع حالات الإصابة إلى10، أقر د.على جمعة مفتى الديار المصرية بجواز استخدام منابر المساجد فى التوعية بمخاطر المرض، بينما نفت وزارة التعليم أى اتجاه لتأجيل امتحانات الثانوية العامة بسبب أنفلونزا الخنازير.
With The "health" to the high incidence of 10, the d. Jumaah the Mufti platforms permits the use of mosques to raise awareness of the dangers of the disease, while the Ministry of Education has denied any tendency to postpone the general secondary school examinations due to swine flu.
كانت الصحة قد أعلنت فى وقت سابق، اليوم الأربعاء، التأكد من إصابة مهندس يعمل بشركة للبترول بالقاهرة، حيث كان يعانى أعراض الأنفلونزا بعد قدومه من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية يوم 7 يونيه الحالى، وبدأ يعانى الأعراض يوم 9 يونيه، وهو حاليا يعالج بمستشفى صدر العباسية، وحالته الصحية مستقرة.
Health has been announced earlier on Wednesday to make sure injured engineer working for an oil company in Cairo, where he was suffering symptoms of the flu after coming from the United States of America on June 7 of this and began to suffer symptoms on June 9, is currently dealing with a hospital, the Abbasid and stable condition.
كما أكدت إصابة الحالة الثانية وهى لمواطن مصرى مقيم بالولايات المتحدة الأمريكية، وصل يوم 4 يونيه، وبدأ يعانى أعراض الأنفلونزا يوم 8 يونيه، وذهب إلى مستشفى حميات الإسكندرية، حيث تم تحويله إلى المستشفى واشتبه فى إصابته بالمرض، وتأكدت إصابته بالمعامل المركزية بالقاهرة وحالته الصحية مستقرة.
Also confirmed the second case, the injury to the Egyptian citizen resident in the United States of America, arrived on June 4, and began suffering flu symptoms on June 8, he went to the hospital and admitted in Alexandria, where he was transferred to the hospital and was suspected of being infected with the disease, confirmed a central labs in Cairo and his condition stable .
وأوضحت الوزارة أن الحالات السبع المصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير من الطلبة الأجانب المقيمين بالسكن الجامعى للجامعة الأمريكية بالزمالك، والذين سبق الإعلان عنهم يعالجون بمستشفى حميات العباسية وحالتهم جميعا مستقرة، لافتا إلى أن المبنى السكنى بالزمالك وجميع المقيمين بداخله تحت الحجر الصحى. The Ministry pointed out that seven cases of infected pigs with avian resident of the foreign students of the university housing the American University, Zamalek, who previously announced their hospital treating fevers Abbasiyah and all their stable, pointing out that Zamalek apartment building and all the residents inside under quarantine.
كما تم فحص عينات من 37 حالة اشتباه إصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير من محافظات: القاهرة وشرم الشيخ والإسماعيلية وكفر الشيخ والجيزة، وكانت النتائج سلبية. Were also examined samples from 37 suspected cases of swine flu in governorates: Cairo, Sharm El-Sheikh, Ismailia, Kafr El-Sheikh, Giza, and the results were negative. كما تم فحص 19 حالة اشتباه إصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الطيور من محافظات القاهرة والدقهلية والقليوبية والإسماعيلية وسوهاج والغربية، وجاءت النتائج سلبية. Were also examined 19 cases of suspected bird flu from the governorates of Cairo, Dakahliya Qalubia, Ismailia and Sohag, the West, and the results were negative.
وعلم اليوم السابع أن سلطات الحجر الصحى بمطار القاهرة الدولى، قامت مساء أمس الثلاثاء، بعزل المجند (محمود عبد الغفار -21 سنة) وفنى الاستقبال والترحيل (أحمد محمد على محمد - 38 عاما)، بمستشفى الحميات بالعباسية للاشتباه فى إصابتهما بفيروس أنفلونزا الخنازير، حيث ظهرت عليهما أعراض الإصابة بالفيروس بعد توقيع الفحص الطبى عليهما. It was learned that the seventh day of the quarantine authorities at Cairo International Airport, the evening on Tuesday, isolating the recruit (Mahmoud Abdel-Ghaffar -21 years) and a technical receiver and deportation (Ahmed Mohamed Ali Mohamed - 38 years), hospital diets بالعباسية on suspicion of avian influenza virus infected pigs, where showing symptoms of infection after the signing of the medical examination on them.
وسادت حالة من التوتر فى مختلف قطاعات الدولة، وترددت إشاعات حول احتمال تأجيل امتحانات الثانوية العامة، إلا أن وزارة التربية والتعليم نفت ذلك على لسان د.رضا أبو سريع رئيس عام امتحانات الثانوية العامة، حيث أكد أنه فى حالة ظهور أعراض المرض على أى طالب داخل اللجان، فإن ذلك لن يؤثر على سير الامتحانات، لأن الثانوية العامة هى مسألة أمن قومى، ولا يمكن تأجيلها لأى سبب من الأسباب. There was a state of tension in the various sectors of the State and there were rumors about a possible postponement of the general secondary examinations, the Ministry of Education has denied that the San d. Rida Abu rapid president in the general secondary examinations, which confirmed that in the case of the emergence of symptoms on any student within the commissions, it will not affect the conduct of examinations, because the secondary was an issue of national security, and can not be postponed for any reason.
وأوضح أبو سريع أنه تقرر تزويد كل لجنة من لجان الثانوية العامة بوحدة طبية متخصصة، تكون مهمتها التدخل الفورى والسريع فى حال ظهور أى عرض من أعراض المرض على أحد الطلاب، مشددا على أنه فى تلك الحالة سيتم عزل الطالب الذى تظهر عليه أعراض المرض، دون أن يؤثر ذلك على سير الامتحان باللجنة التى سيكون بها الطالب. He pointed quick that it decided to provide each of the committee of public secondary specialized medical unit, whose mission will be immediate and rapid intervention in case of any of the symptoms of the disease on one of the students, stressing that in such a situation would be to isolate a student who is showing symptoms of the disease, without affect the conduct of the examination committee, which will be the student.
وأوضح أبو سريع أن الإجراءات التى طالب الدكتور حاتم الجبلى بتوفيرها داخل اللجان متوفرة بالفعل، مشيرا إلى أن جميع اللجان جيدة التهوية وبها منافذ للهواء، كما أن سعة اللجنة لا تزيد على الـ20 طالبا، بما يجعل امتحان الثانوية العامة يجرى فى ظروف صحية جيدة لا مجال معها للحديث عن الإلغاء أو التأجيل. He pointed that the quick action by the Minister asked the woman to provide is already available within the committees, pointing out that all the good ventilation and the air outlets, and the capacity of not more than 20 students, making the general secondary examination conducted in conditions of good health with no to talk about the cancellation or postponement.
وأمام ارتفاع مؤشرات خروج المرض عن السيطرة، أعلن د.على جمعة مفتى الجمهورية، جواز توعية المواطنين بخطورة الوباء من خلال منابر المساجد عقب الصلوات، وأكد فى فتواه أن تلك الأعمال لا تدخل فى باب النهى عن "نشدان الضالة" (النداء عليها) فى المساجد، وذلك لأن نشدان الضالة مصلحة خاصة أما توعية المواطنين فى هذه الحالة فإنه يقع ضمن المنفعة العامة، وهى نوع من دفع الوباء من الانتشار أو القضاء عليه، الأمر الذى يستوجب أن يتعاون الناس جميعا على صده ودفعه. In the face of high indicators of the disease out of control, Dr. Ali Gomaa, Mufti of the Republic, citizens may be aware of the seriousness of the epidemic through the platforms of the mosques after prayers, he said in his fatwa that such acts do not fall in the door of thought on "the pursuit of the misguided" (call it) in the mosques , because the misguided pursuit of a special interest in the awareness of citizens of this situation, it is within the public interest, a kind of push the epidemic from spreading, or elimination, which requires all people to cooperate on fighting and pushing.
وقال جمعة، فى رده على سؤال أحد المواطنين حول مشروعية توعية الناس بخطورة الأوبئة ومنها مرض شلل الأطفال من خلال منابر المساجد عقب الصلوات، إنه إذا كانت تتعلق بوباء منتشر بين الناس كشلل الأطفال مثلا فإنها تصير فرض كفاية بقدر ما يزال به الضرر، مشيرا إلى أنه إذا ما تعينت وحددت المساجد كأحد الطرق الأساسية فى التوعية أو فى محاصرة هذا الوباء ودفعه خاصة فى القرى والتجمعات الصغيرة، التى لا يدرك أهلها خطورة ذلك إلا عن طريق خطباء وأئمة مساجدها، فإن التوعية والنصيحة تصبح فرض عين فى حق الخطباء والأئمة ويكون أطفال المواطنين فى تلك القرى حينئذ أمانة فى أعناقهم.
Juma said, in reply to a question about the legality of a citizen to make people aware of the danger of disease epidemics such as polio through platforms mosques after prayers, said that if the pandemic is widespread among the people the image of children, for example, it will be the imposition of the adequacy of the extent of the damage remains, pointing out that If appointed as one of the mosques and identified ways to raise awareness of the basic or trapped in the epidemic and to pay, especially in villages and small communities, which does not realize the gravity of the people only through the sermons of imams and mosques, the awareness and advice to become an obligation in the right of imams and preachers, and the children of citizens in the villages, then the Secretariat in their necks.
حالة من القلق، تعيشها الحكومة والمواطنون، بعد الإعلان عن ضبط حالتى إصابة جديدتين بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير، وخروج المرض عن سيطرة وزارة الصحة..
Of concern of the government and citizens, after the announcement of the control cases of the deadly new disease, swine flu and the disease out of the control of the Ministry of Health ..
مما أربك كافة قطاعات الدولة، وسط احتمالات بتحول أنفلونزا الخنازير إلى وباء.
Overwhelming all sectors of the state, amid expectations that the transformation of the swine flu epidemic.
وفيما أعلنت "الصحة" ارتفاع حالات الإصابة إلى10، أقر د.على جمعة مفتى الديار المصرية بجواز استخدام منابر المساجد فى التوعية بمخاطر المرض، بينما نفت وزارة التعليم أى اتجاه لتأجيل امتحانات الثانوية العامة بسبب أنفلونزا الخنازير.
With The "health" to the high incidence of 10, the d. Jumaah the Mufti platforms permits the use of mosques to raise awareness of the dangers of the disease, while the Ministry of Education has denied any tendency to postpone the general secondary school examinations due to swine flu.
كانت الصحة قد أعلنت فى وقت سابق، اليوم الأربعاء، التأكد من إصابة مهندس يعمل بشركة للبترول بالقاهرة، حيث كان يعانى أعراض الأنفلونزا بعد قدومه من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية يوم 7 يونيه الحالى، وبدأ يعانى الأعراض يوم 9 يونيه، وهو حاليا يعالج بمستشفى صدر العباسية، وحالته الصحية مستقرة.
Health has been announced earlier on Wednesday to make sure injured engineer working for an oil company in Cairo, where he was suffering symptoms of the flu after coming from the United States of America on June 7 of this and began to suffer symptoms on June 9, is currently dealing with a hospital, the Abbasid and stable condition.
كما أكدت إصابة الحالة الثانية وهى لمواطن مصرى مقيم بالولايات المتحدة الأمريكية، وصل يوم 4 يونيه، وبدأ يعانى أعراض الأنفلونزا يوم 8 يونيه، وذهب إلى مستشفى حميات الإسكندرية، حيث تم تحويله إلى المستشفى واشتبه فى إصابته بالمرض، وتأكدت إصابته بالمعامل المركزية بالقاهرة وحالته الصحية مستقرة.
Also confirmed the second case, the injury to the Egyptian citizen resident in the United States of America, arrived on June 4, and began suffering flu symptoms on June 8, he went to the hospital and admitted in Alexandria, where he was transferred to the hospital and was suspected of being infected with the disease, confirmed a central labs in Cairo and his condition stable .
وأوضحت الوزارة أن الحالات السبع المصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير من الطلبة الأجانب المقيمين بالسكن الجامعى للجامعة الأمريكية بالزمالك، والذين سبق الإعلان عنهم يعالجون بمستشفى حميات العباسية وحالتهم جميعا مستقرة، لافتا إلى أن المبنى السكنى بالزمالك وجميع المقيمين بداخله تحت الحجر الصحى. The Ministry pointed out that seven cases of infected pigs with avian resident of the foreign students of the university housing the American University, Zamalek, who previously announced their hospital treating fevers Abbasiyah and all their stable, pointing out that Zamalek apartment building and all the residents inside under quarantine.
كما تم فحص عينات من 37 حالة اشتباه إصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الخنازير من محافظات: القاهرة وشرم الشيخ والإسماعيلية وكفر الشيخ والجيزة، وكانت النتائج سلبية. Were also examined samples from 37 suspected cases of swine flu in governorates: Cairo, Sharm El-Sheikh, Ismailia, Kafr El-Sheikh, Giza, and the results were negative. كما تم فحص 19 حالة اشتباه إصابة بمرض أنفلونزا الطيور من محافظات القاهرة والدقهلية والقليوبية والإسماعيلية وسوهاج والغربية، وجاءت النتائج سلبية. Were also examined 19 cases of suspected bird flu from the governorates of Cairo, Dakahliya Qalubia, Ismailia and Sohag, the West, and the results were negative.
وعلم اليوم السابع أن سلطات الحجر الصحى بمطار القاهرة الدولى، قامت مساء أمس الثلاثاء، بعزل المجند (محمود عبد الغفار -21 سنة) وفنى الاستقبال والترحيل (أحمد محمد على محمد - 38 عاما)، بمستشفى الحميات بالعباسية للاشتباه فى إصابتهما بفيروس أنفلونزا الخنازير، حيث ظهرت عليهما أعراض الإصابة بالفيروس بعد توقيع الفحص الطبى عليهما. It was learned that the seventh day of the quarantine authorities at Cairo International Airport, the evening on Tuesday, isolating the recruit (Mahmoud Abdel-Ghaffar -21 years) and a technical receiver and deportation (Ahmed Mohamed Ali Mohamed - 38 years), hospital diets بالعباسية on suspicion of avian influenza virus infected pigs, where showing symptoms of infection after the signing of the medical examination on them.
وسادت حالة من التوتر فى مختلف قطاعات الدولة، وترددت إشاعات حول احتمال تأجيل امتحانات الثانوية العامة، إلا أن وزارة التربية والتعليم نفت ذلك على لسان د.رضا أبو سريع رئيس عام امتحانات الثانوية العامة، حيث أكد أنه فى حالة ظهور أعراض المرض على أى طالب داخل اللجان، فإن ذلك لن يؤثر على سير الامتحانات، لأن الثانوية العامة هى مسألة أمن قومى، ولا يمكن تأجيلها لأى سبب من الأسباب. There was a state of tension in the various sectors of the State and there were rumors about a possible postponement of the general secondary examinations, the Ministry of Education has denied that the San d. Rida Abu rapid president in the general secondary examinations, which confirmed that in the case of the emergence of symptoms on any student within the commissions, it will not affect the conduct of examinations, because the secondary was an issue of national security, and can not be postponed for any reason.
وأوضح أبو سريع أنه تقرر تزويد كل لجنة من لجان الثانوية العامة بوحدة طبية متخصصة، تكون مهمتها التدخل الفورى والسريع فى حال ظهور أى عرض من أعراض المرض على أحد الطلاب، مشددا على أنه فى تلك الحالة سيتم عزل الطالب الذى تظهر عليه أعراض المرض، دون أن يؤثر ذلك على سير الامتحان باللجنة التى سيكون بها الطالب. He pointed quick that it decided to provide each of the committee of public secondary specialized medical unit, whose mission will be immediate and rapid intervention in case of any of the symptoms of the disease on one of the students, stressing that in such a situation would be to isolate a student who is showing symptoms of the disease, without affect the conduct of the examination committee, which will be the student.
وأوضح أبو سريع أن الإجراءات التى طالب الدكتور حاتم الجبلى بتوفيرها داخل اللجان متوفرة بالفعل، مشيرا إلى أن جميع اللجان جيدة التهوية وبها منافذ للهواء، كما أن سعة اللجنة لا تزيد على الـ20 طالبا، بما يجعل امتحان الثانوية العامة يجرى فى ظروف صحية جيدة لا مجال معها للحديث عن الإلغاء أو التأجيل. He pointed that the quick action by the Minister asked the woman to provide is already available within the committees, pointing out that all the good ventilation and the air outlets, and the capacity of not more than 20 students, making the general secondary examination conducted in conditions of good health with no to talk about the cancellation or postponement.
وأمام ارتفاع مؤشرات خروج المرض عن السيطرة، أعلن د.على جمعة مفتى الجمهورية، جواز توعية المواطنين بخطورة الوباء من خلال منابر المساجد عقب الصلوات، وأكد فى فتواه أن تلك الأعمال لا تدخل فى باب النهى عن "نشدان الضالة" (النداء عليها) فى المساجد، وذلك لأن نشدان الضالة مصلحة خاصة أما توعية المواطنين فى هذه الحالة فإنه يقع ضمن المنفعة العامة، وهى نوع من دفع الوباء من الانتشار أو القضاء عليه، الأمر الذى يستوجب أن يتعاون الناس جميعا على صده ودفعه. In the face of high indicators of the disease out of control, Dr. Ali Gomaa, Mufti of the Republic, citizens may be aware of the seriousness of the epidemic through the platforms of the mosques after prayers, he said in his fatwa that such acts do not fall in the door of thought on "the pursuit of the misguided" (call it) in the mosques , because the misguided pursuit of a special interest in the awareness of citizens of this situation, it is within the public interest, a kind of push the epidemic from spreading, or elimination, which requires all people to cooperate on fighting and pushing.
وقال جمعة، فى رده على سؤال أحد المواطنين حول مشروعية توعية الناس بخطورة الأوبئة ومنها مرض شلل الأطفال من خلال منابر المساجد عقب الصلوات، إنه إذا كانت تتعلق بوباء منتشر بين الناس كشلل الأطفال مثلا فإنها تصير فرض كفاية بقدر ما يزال به الضرر، مشيرا إلى أنه إذا ما تعينت وحددت المساجد كأحد الطرق الأساسية فى التوعية أو فى محاصرة هذا الوباء ودفعه خاصة فى القرى والتجمعات الصغيرة، التى لا يدرك أهلها خطورة ذلك إلا عن طريق خطباء وأئمة مساجدها، فإن التوعية والنصيحة تصبح فرض عين فى حق الخطباء والأئمة ويكون أطفال المواطنين فى تلك القرى حينئذ أمانة فى أعناقهم.
Juma said, in reply to a question about the legality of a citizen to make people aware of the danger of disease epidemics such as polio through platforms mosques after prayers, said that if the pandemic is widespread among the people the image of children, for example, it will be the imposition of the adequacy of the extent of the damage remains, pointing out that If appointed as one of the mosques and identified ways to raise awareness of the basic or trapped in the epidemic and to pay, especially in villages and small communities, which does not realize the gravity of the people only through the sermons of imams and mosques, the awareness and advice to become an obligation in the right of imams and preachers, and the children of citizens in the villages, then the Secretariat in their necks.
Egypt: Ministry of Health is considering the closure of the subway
June 10, 2009
Information were within the "corridors" of the Ministry of Health, that the ministry was considering a plan to stop flights MRT or reduce the number of subway users, to ensure that the spread of swine flu after the discovery of cases of infection and access to No. 10, as well as the prevalence in different governorates.
وأوردت المعلومات أنه فور الانتهاء من دراسة الخطة سيتم عرضها على مجلس الوزراء للتصديق عليها.
Reported that information immediately upon completion of the study plan will be presented to the Council of Ministers for ratification.
وكشف المهندس عبدالله فوزى، رئيس الإدارة المركزية لتشغيل الخط الأول للمترو، فى تصريحات خاصة لليوم السابع، عن كارثة حقيقية تواجه الشركة المصرية لإدارة وتشغيل المترو، وهى عدم وجود خطة لدى الشركة فى حالة صدور قرار من وزارة الصحة بتقليل أعداد مستخدمى مترو الأنفاق، منعا لانتشار مرض أنفلونزا الخنازير، بعد وصول عدد المصابين بالمرض إلى 10 أشخاص اليوم.
The Engineer Abdullah Fawzy, head of the Central Administration for the operation of the first line of the subway, in a special statement on the seventh day, facing a real disaster for the Egyptian Company for management and operation of the metro, the absence of a plan with the company in the event of a decision of the Ministry of Health to reduce the number of users of the subway, in order to prevent the spread of disease, swine flu, after the arrival of number of people infected with the disease to 10 people today.
أكد فوزى أن الإدارة المركزية لم تتلق أى إخطار من وزارة الصحة بغلق محطات المترو أو تقليل أعداد الركاب، مشيرا إلى صعوبة تنفيذ القرار فى حالة صدوره ، ومنع 2,5 مليون راكب من دخول محطات المترو.
Fawzi stressed that the central administration has not received any notification from the Ministry of Health to close the metro stations or reduce the number of passengers, adding to the difficulty of the implementation of the resolution in the event of issuance, and the prevention of 2.5 million passengers from entering the metro stations.
أضاف فوزى أن الحلول المقترحة لتقليل حجم الكارثة المتوقعة هو تعقيم كل قطار بعد انتهاء رحلته بدخوله المغسلة المخصصة لتنظيف القطارات، بالإضافة إلى الاستعانة بفريق تحت إشراف وزارة الصحة يكون مهامه التواجد فى كل محطة مترو لتعقيم جميع العربات فور وصول القطار إلى المحطة، مؤكدا أن زمن عملية التعقيم لن يؤثر على زمن التقاطر للقطارات.
Fawzi said that the solutions proposed to reduce the magnitude of the disaster is expected sterilization after the end of each train to enter the laundry for the trip to clean up the trains, in addition to a team under the supervision of the Ministry of Health to be his presence in every metro station for the sterilization of all vehicles upon the arrival of the train to the station, saying that the time process sterilization will not affect the long trickle of trains.
Information were within the "corridors" of the Ministry of Health, that the ministry was considering a plan to stop flights MRT or reduce the number of subway users, to ensure that the spread of swine flu after the discovery of cases of infection and access to No. 10, as well as the prevalence in different governorates.
وأوردت المعلومات أنه فور الانتهاء من دراسة الخطة سيتم عرضها على مجلس الوزراء للتصديق عليها.
Reported that information immediately upon completion of the study plan will be presented to the Council of Ministers for ratification.
وكشف المهندس عبدالله فوزى، رئيس الإدارة المركزية لتشغيل الخط الأول للمترو، فى تصريحات خاصة لليوم السابع، عن كارثة حقيقية تواجه الشركة المصرية لإدارة وتشغيل المترو، وهى عدم وجود خطة لدى الشركة فى حالة صدور قرار من وزارة الصحة بتقليل أعداد مستخدمى مترو الأنفاق، منعا لانتشار مرض أنفلونزا الخنازير، بعد وصول عدد المصابين بالمرض إلى 10 أشخاص اليوم.
The Engineer Abdullah Fawzy, head of the Central Administration for the operation of the first line of the subway, in a special statement on the seventh day, facing a real disaster for the Egyptian Company for management and operation of the metro, the absence of a plan with the company in the event of a decision of the Ministry of Health to reduce the number of users of the subway, in order to prevent the spread of disease, swine flu, after the arrival of number of people infected with the disease to 10 people today.
أكد فوزى أن الإدارة المركزية لم تتلق أى إخطار من وزارة الصحة بغلق محطات المترو أو تقليل أعداد الركاب، مشيرا إلى صعوبة تنفيذ القرار فى حالة صدوره ، ومنع 2,5 مليون راكب من دخول محطات المترو.
Fawzi stressed that the central administration has not received any notification from the Ministry of Health to close the metro stations or reduce the number of passengers, adding to the difficulty of the implementation of the resolution in the event of issuance, and the prevention of 2.5 million passengers from entering the metro stations.
أضاف فوزى أن الحلول المقترحة لتقليل حجم الكارثة المتوقعة هو تعقيم كل قطار بعد انتهاء رحلته بدخوله المغسلة المخصصة لتنظيف القطارات، بالإضافة إلى الاستعانة بفريق تحت إشراف وزارة الصحة يكون مهامه التواجد فى كل محطة مترو لتعقيم جميع العربات فور وصول القطار إلى المحطة، مؤكدا أن زمن عملية التعقيم لن يؤثر على زمن التقاطر للقطارات.
Fawzi said that the solutions proposed to reduce the magnitude of the disaster is expected sterilization after the end of each train to enter the laundry for the trip to clean up the trains, in addition to a team under the supervision of the Ministry of Health to be his presence in every metro station for the sterilization of all vehicles upon the arrival of the train to the station, saying that the time process sterilization will not affect the long trickle of trains.
Egypt: Cases of avian influenza in Kafr Sheikh
محمد عبد الفتاح (3 سنوات)، وخضرة السعيد (35 سنة)، وهويدا أمين سعد (45 سنة)، وروان السعيد مرسي (9 شهور)، وعطية شحاتة عطية (7 سنوات)، ومحمد عبد العزيز سرحان (5 سنوات)، وإسماعيل عبد الحميد (40 سنة)، ومحمد عبد العزيز عبد التواب (8 سنوات). ومن ناحية أخرى، أعلنت وزارة الصحة أن حالة المريض التي تم تشخيصها على أنها اشتباه بإنفلونزا الخنازير بكفر الشيخ ظهرت نتيجة العينة سلبية، وأن أحمد خضر صلاح حماد الذي كان قادمًا من إيطاليا من أسبوع يعاني فقط من ارتفاع درجة الحرارة. وعلى صعيد آخر، أعلنت الرقابة التموينية بكفر الشيخ أنها أعدمت 55 ألف طائر، كما أعلن إسلام فاروق رئيس مباحث التموين عن إعدام 200 ألف طائر يصل ثمنها إلى نحو 3 ملايين جنيه
Hospital diets Andz Sheikh kaafirs 8 suspected cases of bird flu, namely: Mona Mohamed Abdel-Fattah (3 years), and Al-Khadra (35 years), the Secretary Huwaida Saad (45 years), and Rowan, Al-Mursi (9 months), and Attia Attia Shehata (7 years), Mohamed Abdul Aziz Sarhan (5 years), and Abdel-Hamid Ismail (40 years), and Mohamed Abdel-Aziz Abdel-Tawab (8 years).
On the other hand, the Ministry of Health that the patient's condition that were diagnosed as suspected avian swine Shaikh kaafirs sample showed a negative result, and Salah al-Hammad, Ahmed Khadr, who was from Italy only a week to suffer from high temperature.
On the other hand, the control ration in Kafr Sheikh as 55 thousand birds were culled, as announced by the President Faruq al-Islam Investigation on the execution of supply 200 thousand birds, priced at around 3 million pounds
Hospital diets Andz Sheikh kaafirs 8 suspected cases of bird flu, namely: Mona Mohamed Abdel-Fattah (3 years), and Al-Khadra (35 years), the Secretary Huwaida Saad (45 years), and Rowan, Al-Mursi (9 months), and Attia Attia Shehata (7 years), Mohamed Abdul Aziz Sarhan (5 years), and Abdel-Hamid Ismail (40 years), and Mohamed Abdel-Aziz Abdel-Tawab (8 years).
On the other hand, the Ministry of Health that the patient's condition that were diagnosed as suspected avian swine Shaikh kaafirs sample showed a negative result, and Salah al-Hammad, Ahmed Khadr, who was from Italy only a week to suffer from high temperature.
On the other hand, the control ration in Kafr Sheikh as 55 thousand birds were culled, as announced by the President Faruq al-Islam Investigation on the execution of supply 200 thousand birds, priced at around 3 million pounds
Swine flu strikes of one of Egypt .. 10 The discovery of new injuries in Cairo and Alexandr
Caption:
وكان الجبلى أعلن لثلاثاء أن التحاليل التى أجريت على الطلبة فى مقر سكن طلاب الجامعة الأمريكية بحى الزمالك بالقاهرة أكدت إصابة خمسة طلاب آخرين بفيروس "إتش 1 إن1" المعروف عالميا باسم إنفلونزا الخنازير ليرتفع عدد المصابين بالمقر إلى سبعة حالات إكتشفتها وزارة الصحة . The mountain was declared Tuesday that tests conducted on students in the residence of students of the American University in Cairo district of Zamalek confirmed wounding five other students with "1 HP 1 that" universally known as the swine flu, bringing the number of injured at seven cases discovered by the Ministry of Health.
| احد قاطني حي الزمالك One of the residents of Zamalek |
 | |||
| احد قاطني حي الزمالك One of the residents of Zamalek |
القاهرة: واصل فيروس "اتش 1 - ان 1" المعروف بـ "إنفلونزا الخنازير" ضرباته المتتالية للشارع المصري ليزيد بذلك قلق وخوف المصريين من سرعة انتشاره وفشل الأجهزة المعنية في السيطرة عليه كما حدث بالنسبة لفيروس انفلونزا الطيور. Cairo: The virus "H 1 - to 1," known as "swine flu" successive blows of the Egyptian street, increasing anxiety and fear that the rapid spread of the Egyptians and the failure of the organs concerned in the control as to what happened to the bird flu virus.
فبعد الإعلان أمس وأول أمس عن إصابة 7 أجانب بينهم أمريكيون يدرسون بالجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة، أعلن الدكتور عبد الرحمن شاهين المتحدث الرسمى بوزارة الصحة المصرية اليوم الأربعاء أنه تم اكتشاف حالتين جديدتين مصابتين بإنفلونزا الخنازير. After the announcement yesterday and the day before the injury of 7 foreigners, including Americans studying the American University in Cairo, Dr. Abdel Rahman Shahin, official spokesman of Health Ministry said Wednesday that the discovery of two new bird flu pigs.
وقال شاهين إن إحدى الحالتين المصابتين فى مدينة الاسكندرية بينما الأخرى في مدينة القاهرة .. Sahin said that one of the injured was in both cases, the city of Alexandria, while the other in the city of Cairo .. مشيرا إلى أن عدد الحالات التي تأكد إصابتها بالفيروس يصل بذلك إلى عشر حالات. He pointed out that the number of confirmed cases of HIV infection, bringing to ten cases.
على صعيد متصل ، احتجزت سلطات الحجر الصحى بمطار الغردقة صباح الأربعاء حالتى اشتباه لإنفلونزا الخنازير لسائح دنماركى وطفل تشيكى وعزلهما بالقسم الفندقى بمستشفى الغردقة العام. Meanwhile, detained by the quarantine authorities of Hurghada Airport on Wednesday morning on suspicion of two of the swine flu of a Danish tourist and a child, a Czech and a section isolated hotel Hurghada General Hospital.
وصرح الدكتور محمد رفاعى مدير إدارة الطب الوقائى بمديرية الصحة بالبحر الأحمر بأن الطفل يدعى ماتى بافيل ويبلغ من العمر 3 سنوات والسائح الدنماركى يدعى لينارد فينر 25 عاما . Dr. Mohamed Al-Rifai Director of the Department of Health's Preventive Medicine Department of the Red Sea that the child named Matti Pavel, a 3-year-old Danish tourist was identified as 25-year-old Leonard Weiner.
وكانت أجهزة المسح الحرارى بمطار الغردقة الدولى قد كشفت عن ارتفاع حرارة السائح الدنماركى والطفل التشيكى ، وقررت أجهزة الحجر الصحى عزلهما بغرف العزل فى المطار ونقلهما إلى جناح العزل بالقسم الفندقى بمستشفى الغردقة العام تحت الملاحظة والرعاية الطبية. The organs of the thermal survey of Hurghada International Airport has revealed a high temperature of the tourist and the child, Czech, Danish, and decided to quarantine isolation rooms to isolate them at the airport and transferred to the isolation wing of the hotel section of Hurghada General Hospital under observation and medical care.
يذكر ان أول اكتشاف لاصابات بفيروس "إتش 1 إن1" المعروف عالميا باسم إنفلونزا الخنازير فى مصر كانت للطفلة "مريم" 12 سنة المصرية أمريكية الجنسية ، وأعقبها تأكيد اصابة طالب وطالبة فى مقر سكن طلاب الجامعة الأمريكية بحى الزمالك بالقاهرة ، ثم أكدت وزارة الصحة إصابة خمسة طلاب آخرين ليرتفع عدد المصابين بالمقر إلى سبعة حالات. The first discovery of the infection, "HP 1 that 1" is known universally as the swine flu in Egypt was of the girl child, "Mary" 12 years of Egyptian-American citizenship, and was followed by a confirmation students at the American University student housing district, Zamalek, Cairo, and then confirmed by the Ministry of Health, five other students taking the death toll at seven cases.
وذكر وزير الصحة الدكتور حاتم الجبلي الثلاثاء أن جميع المصابين السبعة وصلوا إلى المبنى 4 يونيو/حزيران الجارى وهم من الطلبة القادمين من الولايات المتحدة للدراسة الصيفية بالجامعة. The Minister of Health Dr. Hatem el-Gabali on Tuesday that all seven wounded arrived at the building on June 4 of this are the students from the United States to study the summer university.
رعب في الشارع المصري Terror in the Egyptian street
 | |||
| مبى الجامعة الامريكية Set the American University |
في هذه الأثناء، انتشرت حالة من الذعر بين المواطنين خاصة فى الجامعة الأمريكية ومنطقتى الزمالك بالقاهرة والمعادى الجديدة بحلوان، بعد أن الإعلان عن ارتفاع عدد المصابين بفيروس أنفلونزا الخنازير إلى سبعة أشخاص كلهم من الطلبة الأمريكيين الذينيدرسونبالجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة.. In the meantime, have a state of panic among the citizens, especially in the regions and the American University in Cairo, Zamalek, Maadi and Helwan, the new, after the announcement of the increase in the number of pigs infected with avian influenza to seven persons, all of the students of America Alvenidersonpaljamap Americans in Cairo ..
وسيطر الخوف على اهالي المنطقة بأسرها حتى أن تقريرا لبرنامج "البيت بيتك" الذي يعرضه التليفزيون المصري أظهر شبابيك منطقة الزمالك مغلقة ، والأهالى مرتدين الكمامات فى الشوارع وكأن الجو بالكمال أصبح ملوثا. Fear and control to the people of the region as a whole so that a report of the program, "Make yourself at home," offered by the Egyptian television showed the Zamalek area windows closed, and people wearing masks on the streets and the perfect atmosphere became polluted.
كما سادت حالة من الذعر والقلق العاملين والطلاب بالجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة الجديدة بعد اكتشاف 7 حالات مصابة بأنفلونزا الخنازير وفرض حظر صحي علي المبني السكني بالجامعة بالزمالك بينما تجاهل المقر الرئيسي للجامعة بالقاهرة الجديدة تحذيرات وزارة الصحة رغم تواجد الطلاب المصابين. Also prevailed in a state of panic and concern, staff and students of American University in Cairo, after the discovery of 7 new cases of pigs infected with bird healthy and a ban on the building housing the university's Zamalek, while ignoring the main headquarters of the University of Cairo, the new warnings, the Ministry of Health, despite the presence of the injured students.
وحاول وزير الصحة المصري د. And tried to Egyptian Health Minister Dr.. حاتم الجبلي طمأنة المواطنين والتقليل من مخاوفهم في مداخلة على الهاتف من لندن للبرنامج، وأكد على أن هذا المرض بالإثباتات العلمية أقل خطورة من الأنفلوانزا العادية ... The woman to reassure citizens and reduce the fear of intervention on the phone from London for the program, and stressed that the scientific evidence of the disease less dangerous than regular influenza ... كما أنه غير قاتل ... It is also not fatal ... ولكن الإحتراز من قبل مؤسسة الصحة العالمية لتخوفهم من تحور المرض كما حدث من قبل. But to guard against by the World Health Foundation fears the disease could mutate as has happened before.
في هذه الأثناء، أكد الدكتور دافيد ارنولد رئيس الجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة أن الجامعة تتعاون مع وزارة الصحة المصرية في كل شيء لضمان سلامة الطلاب مهما كلفني الأمر وسوف نساعد الطلاب حتى لا يضار احد من توقف الدراسة . In the meantime, Dr. David Arnold, president of the American University in Cairo that the University will cooperate with the Egyptian Ministry of Health in everything to ensure the safety of students, whatever it costs, and will help the students so as not to harm one of the study stopped.
وأضاف لفضائية "الحياة اليوم" أتمنى ان يسمعنى كل ولى أمر لطلاب الجامعة الأمريكية لأطمئنهم فهم تحت رعايتنا وفى أيدي أمينة. The space for "life today," I heard all that the Crown is the American university students to assure them the understanding of the care and in good hands.
نتيجة العينات العشوائية سلبية The result of random samples negative
على صعيد آخر، أكد الدكتور عمرو قنديل وكيل وزارة الصحة للشئون الوقائية أن نتائج جميع العينات العشوائية التى تم أخذها من الطلبة والإدارييين والأساتذة من الجامعة الأمريكية بالتجمع الخامس بالقاهرة والبالغ عددهم 158 شخصا لفحصها وتحليلها للتأكد من خلوها من فيروس إنفلونزا الخنازير جاءت جميعها سلبية. On the other hand, Dr. Amr Kandil and Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health for Preventive Affairs, that the results of all the random samples were taken from Alidareyen students and professors from the American University in Cairo and the fifth assembly of the 158 people examined and analyzed to make sure that they are free of swine flu virus were all negative.
كما أكد أن المبنى الخاص بالجامعة الأمريكية بالزمالك مازال تحت الحجر الصحى حتى يتم التأكد من خلو جميع الموجودين به من مرض إنفلونزا الخنازير وذلك من خلال المتابعة اليومية. He also stressed that the building on the American University in Zamalek is still under quarantine to be sure that all those of avian and swine from the follow-up during the day.
وأوضح عمرو قنديل أنه بالنسبة للمهندس الكولومبى القادم من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية ويعمل بشركة "جابكو" للبترول بالمعادى تم حجزه بالمستشفى وتم أخذ عينة منه لتحليلها وإعطائه عقار "تاميفلو" وستظهر غدا نتيجة التحاليل الخاصة به. The MENA, for the Colombian engineer from the United States is working with the "Jibiku" Petroleum Maadi been detained in hospital was taking a sample for analysis, giving the drug "Tamiflu", and will be tested on its own.
إصابات مؤكدة Injuries uncertain
 | |||
| حاتم الجبلي وزير الصحة المصري The woman and the Egyptian Minister of Health |
وأكد الجبلى أنه تم إجراء عزل صحى كامل على المبنى السكنى للجامعة الأمريكية بالزمالك وإجراء التحاليل على أكثر من 240 طالبا وطالبة بها للتأكد من عدم إصابتهم، وأن هذا العزل سيستمر لمدة أسبوع ، وفى نفس الوقت سيتم رصد جميع ركاب الطائرتين اللتين وصل عليهما الطالب والطالبة اللذان قدما من الولايات المتحدة وتأكد إصابتهما بمرض إنفلونزا الخنازير وذلك للتأكد من عدم إصابة ركاب الطائرتين. The mountain had been healthy the whole procedure to isolate the residential building of the American University, Zamalek and analysis on more than 240 students to make sure they were not, and that this isolation will continue for one week, at the same time, passengers will be monitored all the planes, which arrived by the student and the student who made from the United States and confirmed infected with swine flu in order to check if there were a passenger aircraft.
وطمأن وزير الصحة كل المصريين بأن الإجراءات الصحية التى تجرى على جميع منافذ ومطارات مصر هى إجراءات مشددة وكافية ، وهناك حرص على متابعة الركاب القادمين من الدول الموبؤة خلال فترة إقامتهم بمصر ولمدة عشرة أيام حيث أنه يصعب إكتشاف الحالات الحاضنة للمرض فى بدايته. The Health Minister assured the Egyptians that all health measures, which take place at all ports and airports in Egypt are strict procedures and adequate, and there's the follow-up of passengers coming from countries infested during their stay in Egypt for a period of ten days since it is difficult to detect cases of the disease in the incubator inception.
من جانبه، أكد الدكتور نصر السيد مساعد وزير الصحة للشئون الوقائية أن الحالات الخمس التى أعلن عن اكتشاف إصابتها بانفلونزا الخنازير هم من الأجانب المقيمين داخل مبنى السكن الخاص لطلبة الجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة. For his part, Mr. Al-Nasr, Assistant Minister of Health Affairs of the five cases that preventive announced the discovery of bird flu in pigs are resident aliens inside a building housing for students on the American University in Cairo.
وأضاف أنه تم اكتشافهم فى إطار المسح الصحى والتقصى الوبائى الذى تقوم به وزارة الصحة لجميع الموجودين بالمبنى وتم نقلهم إلى المستشفيات بالقاهرة واعطاؤهم عقار "التاميفلو" وحالاتهم الصحية جميعا مستقرة. Had been discovered in the framework of health surveys and epidemiological study carried out by the Ministry of Health to all those building and were rushed to hospitals in Cairo and given the drug "Tamiflu", and their health are all stable.
وأشار الدكتور نصر السيد مساعد وزير الصحة للشئون الوقائية إلى أنه سيتم استمرار إتخاذ كافة الإجراءات الوقائية من التنظيف والتطهير للأسطح والأرضيات وكذلك التهوية الجيدة للمبنى تحت إشراف القطاع الوقائى بوزارة الصحة. And Dr. Sayed, Assistant Minister of Health for Preventive Affairs that will continue to take all preventive measures of cleaning and disinfection of surfaces and flooring, as well as good ventilation of the building under the supervision of the Ministry of preventive health sector.
وأوضح أنه تم أخذ عينات وهى عبارة عن مسحات من الحلق لجميع المتواجدين فى المبنى وجميع أساتذة الجامعة الأمريكية المقيمين بالمبنى وجميع العاملين المصريين بالمبنى وبلغت جملة العينات نحو 165 عينة وكانت نتيجة الفحص المعملى إيجابية بالنسبة لخمس حالات بالاضافة الى الحالتين اللتين أعلن عن إصابتهما الاثنين وبذلك تبلغ جملة الاصابات داخل المبنى سبع حالات. He pointed out that sampling is a throat swab samples from all personnel present in the building and all the American University Professors, and all residents of the building, the building of the Egyptian and total about 165 samples and the sample was the result of a positive lab test for the five cases in addition to the two cases announced on Monday that injured a total injuries in the building of seven cases.
وقال الدكتور نصر السيد إنه تم أخذ 111 عينة من العاملين المصريين بالمبنى وغير المقيمين به وغير الخاضعين للحجر الصحى وجاءت جميع نتائج العينات سلبية للمرض. And Dr. Sayed had been taking a sample of 111 Egyptian workers building and non-residents and not subject to quarantine, and the results of all samples were negative for the disease.
وذكر أن جميع المصابين السبعة وصلوا إلى المبنى يوم 4 يونيو الجارى وهم من الطلبة القادمين من الولايات المتحدة للدراسة الصيفية بالجامعة. It was reported that all seven wounded arrived at the building on June 4 of this are the students from the United States to study the summer university.
واستقبل مستشفى حميات العباسية، ظهر أمس، المصابين الخمسة لتلقى العلاج، وقالت مصادر طبية إنه تم إعطاؤهم عقار "تاميفلو" والمضادات الحيوية، وأصبحت حالاتهم الصحية مستقرة. The hospital received Abbasiyah fevers, yesterday, five injured for medical treatment, medical sources said had been given the drug "Tamiflu", and antibiotics, and their health has become stable.
وكانت وزارة الصحة المصرية أعلنت الاثنين ظهور حالتى إصابة جديدتين بفيروس أنفلونزا الخنازير،لطالب وطالبة يدرسان بالجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة، قدما من الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية منذ 28 مايو الماضى، لكن لم تكتشف إصابتهما بالمرض إلا فى الخامس من يونيو/حزيران الجارى، The Egyptian Health Ministry Monday announced the emergence of new cases of the deadly swine flu virus, for students studying the American University in Cairo, ahead of the United States since May 28 last, but not infected with the disease detected only on the fifth of June of this
مما يعنى أنهما عاشا فى القاهرة وتجولا فى شوارعها أكثر من أسبوع، وهما يحملان الفيروس، الذى ينتقل - حسب منظمة الصحة العالمية - من إنسان لآخر عبر المخالطة اليومية، وعلى إثر ذلك، قررت الجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة تعليق الدراسة بكليات الجامعة حتي يوم الاحد المقبل. Which means that they lived in Cairo and in the streets Tjola more than a week, and are carrying the virus, which is transmitted - by the World Health Organization - from human to human through contact daily, and following that, the American University in Cairo, the suspension of the faculties of the university until next Sunday.
الاقتراب من إعلان المرض وباء عالمياً Approach of the Declaration of the disease and pandemic
من ناحية أخرى، قالت منظمة الصحة العالمية الثلاثاء إنها تقترب من الاعلان عن وباء عالمي بسبب فيروس (اتش1ان1) المعروف باسم إنفلونزا الخنازير والذي أصاب أكثر من 26500 شخص في 73 بلدا. On the other hand, the World Health Organization said Tuesday it is close to the announcement of the pandemic virus (H 1 to 1), known as swine flu, which has more than 26500 people in 73 countries.
وأبدى كيجي فوكودا القائم بأعمال مساعد الامين العام لمنظمة الصحة العالمية عن قلقه من الانتشار المستمر للسلالة الجديدة في دول منها أستراليا عقب انتشارها على نطاق واسع في أمريكا الشمالية. The Keiji Fukuda, acting assistant secretary-general of the World Health Organization expressed concern about the continuing spread of the strain of the new countries, including Australia after the large-scale outbreaks in North America.
وردا على سؤال بشأن مااذا كانت هناك أي شكوك من أن يكون الوباء عالميا فقال في مؤتمر صحفي عبر الهاتف "اننا نقترب كثيرا من ذلك." In response to a question on whether there were any doubts that the global epidemic, said in a telephone news conference, "We are approaching a lot of that."
في سياق متصل، تستضيف المكسيك قمة حول مرض انفلونزا الخنازير من 1 الي 3يوليو /تموز في منتجع كانكون (شرق) بعد ثلاثة اشهر على ظهور المرض الذي اودى بحياة 106 اشخاص في البلاد، حسب ما اعلنت وزارة الصحة. In a related development, Mexico is hosting the summit on bird flu from pigs 1 to July 3 in the resort of Cancun (east) three months after the emergence of the disease, which killed 106 people in the country, according to the Ministry of Health.
وجاء في بيان للوزارة ان القمة ستجمع "40 بلدا بالاضافة الى المدير العام لمنظمة الصحة العالمية مارجريت شان ومديرة الصحة في القارة الامريكية ميرتا روزيز". The ministry said in a statement that the summit will be "40 countries in addition to the Director-General of the World Health Organization Margaret Chan and the Director of Health in the Americas Mirta Roziz."
من ناحيته، اكد وزير الصحة المكسيكي خوسيه انخيل كوردوفا السيطرة على المرض في المكسيك بعد شهرين على وصوله الى القمة. For his part, said Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova Mexican control of the disease in Mexico, two months after the arrival at the summit.
واضاف ان الحالات الجديدة قليلة ومعزولة، وتعود اخر حالة الى 3يونيو/حزيران واخر وفاة سجلت في 31 مايو/ايار 2009 ولهذا السبب ننوي رفع حالة الانذار. He said the new cases are few and isolated, and the last case to June 3 and the latest deaths were recorded in May 31, 2009 For this reason, we intend to raise the alert status.
FULL TRANSCRIPT OF JUNE 9 VITUAL PRESS CONFERENCE
Transcript of virtual press conference with Dick Thompson, Communications office, and Dr Keiji Fukuda, Assistant Director-General ad Interim for Health Security and Environment, World Health Organization9 June 2009
Dick Thompson: Welcome to the WHO 5 o'clock virtual press briefing. Today’s briefing, Tuesday 9 June, is an update of influenza A(H1N1) situation with Dr Keiji Fukuda. We will start with a statement by Dr Fukuda and then we will take your questions. I would now like to hand over to Dr Keiji Fukuda.
Dr Fukuda: As usual with this briefing, I will do a quick update then there are some issues that I will highlight, and then I will throw it open to questions. As of today, which is 9 June 2009, the number of countries reporting laboratory-confirmed cases to WHO is 73 and the number of laboratory-confirmed cases reported to WHO is 26 563. This is a little bit more advanced than the numbers that are posted on the web right now. In these cases, this includes 249 deaths (this was an error and was corrected later). In terms of what we are seeing right now, we continue to see the spread of this virus evolve and we continue to see new countries report the virus, and we continue to see evolution of activity within countries. As we have for the past several weeks, we continue to see ongoing infection occur within community in North America but we also have increasing reports of activity occurring in the Southern Hemisphere, particularly from South America and countries such as Chile, as well as from other countries, such as Australia. We know that Australia, for example, is seeing a great deal of activity in Victoria at the community level. In addition, similar to the activity in previous weeks, we continue to note that there is activity going on in Europe. In terms of the virus, at this point, it is fair to say that the virus that we are seeing is relatively the same as the virus that we saw several weeks ago and there are no major changes to report at this time. The virus continues to be sensitive to oseltamavir and zanamivir, two antivirals drugs usually against this virus. In terms of the epidemiology, we continue to see that the majority of infections are occurring in younger age groups, people younger than 60 and this is not exclusive. There are infections that are occurring in older people. In terms of the clinical picture, what we are seeing in the southern hemisphere is similar to what has been reported from the northern hemisphere. That is, most of the people who have gotten infected have self-limiting illness which can be taken care of at home, or without specialized medical care and these people recover. However, as noted, there have been a number of serious cases – typically these are pneumonia cases or cases of respiratory failure sometimes requiring ventilators, sometimes ending in fatalities. Much of the earlier epidemiology of this situation was characterized by seeing infections occur in travellers, in institutions such as schools, sometimes military institutions and cruise ships. As we see the situation evolved, we know that outbreaks can occur in communities. And again this is the overall pattern that we are seeing. There are some examples, however, that we are paying very close attention to. For example, up in Canada, we know that there are reports of infections occurring in Inuit communities with a disproportionate number of serious cases occurring. These are observations of concern to us. Now, there have been a number of questions which have been posed to WHO over the past weeks since we last had a press briefing, so what I would like to is go for a couple of them. For example, one of the most basic questions that has come up is simply “What is a pandemic?” So here let me review what we are seeing and why we consider this situation which is potentially evolving into a pandemic. What we are seeing right now is the emergence of a new influenza virus that has not been previously known to infect people. What that means is that most people in the world really have very little background immunity to such a virus. We are seeing that this virus is spreading rapidly around the world, again the characteristics of previous pandemic viruses, and we are also seeing that the disease patterns caused by this virus are not what we see for seasonal influenza. For example, in the northern hemisphere we have seen a great deal of activity occurring in the summer months, and we also have seen that most of the infections are occurring in younger people with the serious complications also occurring in the younger people. Again these are patterns which are not what we see with normal seasonal influenza. When you put all of these things together, what it really suggests is that we are in a situation which is really moving towards more or less a pandemic type of situation. The pandemic really refers to the fact that we are seeing the geographical spread of a virus that is causing this disease. The second question that has come up is about the name of the virus. We know that the situation has been confusing. For example, right now, we know that there are H1N1 viruses which have been circulating in people for a number of years. This is a new H1N1 virus. And we also know that there had been H1N1 viruses which had been circulating in swine or in pigs for many years. And this has really led to a complicated situation of what you call a new virus. One of the primary concerns and one of the difficulties of naming such a new virus is to avoid adverse effects, or stigma associated with a virus name, especially if it causes some unwanted effects in either some sector or in some groups of people. For example, we have seen in association with this outbreak concerns about food, concerns about pigs, which for our practical purposes are not warranted. Food has been perfectly safe, pork meat has not posed a danger for people, yet there has been a fair amount of anxiety associated with the virus originating in pigs and so to call this a swine flu virus is something that is really has a lot of potential for causing greater anxiety associated with eating pork or with these animals which is unwarranted. We have also seen that in past pandemics, the naming of viruses associated with geographical locations can often lead to a stigma and erroneous association that somehow the virus is more dangerous in an area, or perhaps associated with an area. This can manifest itself by travel restrictions or travel concerns that may not be warranted. And so again, in approaching the whole issue of naming the virus, these are some of the issues with which many people – not just WHO – but many people in scientific societies and different groups have been wrestling with. We hope to come up with names that are easy enough to remember, easy enough to use but really do not cause harm for either people or for sectors. This is one of the issues that has been wrestled with right now. Another question that has come up is that “Are we in Phase 6 now, or why haven't we declare Phase 6 now?" In here I think I simply want to say that we know that the virus is spreading and we are now seeing that activity is picking up in a number of countries and this is, as I had mentioned before last week, we know that we are getting closer to probably a pandemic situation. But in the period of time since we last discussed this, I want you to know that WHO has been working extremely hard in terms of preparing countries, in terms of preparing populations for what a potential move to Phase 6 or pandemic would entail. For example, there is work that is being undertaken right now so people understand really what does a pandemic mean, what does going to Phase 6 mean? Does this mean that we are seeing something really severe change? Does this mean that there is a need for drastic actions to be taken? And here I want to point out that by going to Phase 6, what this would mean is that spread of the virus has continued and that activity has become established in at least two regions of the world. It does not mean that the severity of the situation has increased and that people are getting seriously sick at higher numbers or higher rates than they are right now. This is a very important point for countries to understand, for the media to understand, even if it is a little bit paradoxical. You would think that by going up scale would mean that the level of concern should go up, but really what the going up a scale would mean is that we are seeing greater spread of the virus. We are working with different groups to make sure these kinds of messages are understood and the difference between severity and geographical spread is understood. As I discussed last week, right at this time, we considered the situation and the impact on countries to be relatively moderate, and this is again a critical point. If there are some uncertainties, I hope you come back with questions on this. One of the other things that is very important to understand and there has been a number questions about this, are changes over time. We are, as we have pointed out, I think a number of times in the past, at the beginning of the spread of this virus. Unless this virus suddenly disappears overnight, it is likely that the spread of this virus will continue and that activity will increase in some countries and go up and down in other countries. Now we know from past pandemics that in these kinds of situations, we can expect potential changes as we go through different populations and overtime. What does this mean? Well, it means that if we see spread of this virus into populations which are especially vulnerable, it means we may see more severe disease than we would see in populations which are relatively well off. I think the current reports coming from Canada about what has been seen in some of the Inuit villages is a good example of this. These are some of the potential changes that we know we could see as the virus moves through the southern hemisphere, different kinds of changes may happen overtime. If we look to the past, we see that how the outbreaks have behaved early on in a pandemic can be different than how the outbreaks occur later in the year, and months later. Again this whole concept that situation can change is important for everybody to understand because things may need to change, may need to be adapted, actions to be taken by countries and by people, and so on if situations change. The last point that I will cover before we throw it open for questions is really another difficult issue. This simply has to do with uncertainties. Whenever we see a new disease, whenever we see any kind of large series of outbreaks caused by viruses that are new to the scene, we are in a period of great uncertainty. This is true of the current period right now. One of the difficulties for decision-makers and countries and public health institutions is that they need to make decisions, they need to move ahead even though many things are not so clear or are not known. To give you an example, right now, we know what the impact of the virus has been up to now in countries that are relatively developed, or in a number of other countries in which the number of infections has been relatively small. But we do not know what the impact on the population would be as the numbers of infected people grow in populations, for example, in Africa or other continents where they may be large numbers of vulnerable people. We also do not know how this virus is going to evolve. It could become more mild over time, or it could become more severe over time, or it could stay pretty much as it is now. These are uncertainties that we have to take into account but we really do not know how that is going to go forward. Finally, we also do not know how in this global era in which there is so much media coverage, how populations will respond if we move to a pandemic situation, or a pandemic declaration. For example, will the kinds of information being provided by countries and by media really be enough to address the anxieties of people or will people feel more anxious in this situation, and then how would they behave? These are really important considerations for public health authorities and for people who are working to make sure we have balanced an approach and a balanced response to handling the situation as possible. So at this current period right now, as we see the situation evolve, I can just summarize that WHO and its many partners, the Member States, the many public health institutions we are working with are really working to make sure that as the situation evolves we take all possible steps to reduce any adverse effects, any unwanted actions associated with uncertainties of a pandemic situation. With that let me stop and then let us throw it open for questions.
David Brown, The Washington Post: I am wondering if you can talk a little bit about the deaths and hospitalizations among people who do not have underlying medical risk situations or states that put them at higher risk? And I am wondering if there is any entity that is trying to sort of aggregate those serious cases that do not have underlying complications to try to see what might be going on, what obvious, or if there are any risk factors that can be elucidated that are not obvious ones?
Dr Fukuda: Even though the proportion of people dying who were previously healthy with those who are dying with some kinds of pre-existing medical conditions vary somewhat from location to location. It is probably fair to say that approximately half the people who have died from this H1N1 infection have been previously healthy people. This is one of the observations that has given us the most concern. I think that some weeks ago there was a lot of push by different groups to say that the pandemic was mild, that the disease was mild, but from the outset and from the reports coming from Mexico, we knew that a number of the deaths had taken place among younger people who were previously healthy. This is a kind of pattern that we have seen with the H5N1 virus, this is a pattern and a consequence that we have seen in earlier pandemics and so it did and it continues to give us a great deal of concern. Among those people who have died – or previously healthy people who have died – from this viral infection, we know that some of them have died with clinical pictures consistent with respiratory failure, probably consistent with viral pneumonia. That is when the virus itself directly infects the lungs and causes infection, as opposed to secondary bacterial infections. But I do not think we know really why did those people die as opposed to the many other people who recovered, what kinds of underlying factors led to fatal illnesses. There are a number of institutions, a number of physicians who are looking at these cases and trying to understand if there anything that can be uncovered which provides some clues as to why some previously healthy people end up having fatal infections. Right now it is not possible to point out what may distinguish that group from other healthy people.
Helen Branswell, the Canadian Press: Dr Fukuda, at the beginning of your remarks you said that in Australia a great deal of activity is being seen in Victoria at the community level. Why then has the WHO not declared a pandemic, is there any doubt in your mind that this is a pandemic at this point?
Dr Fukuda: I think that we are really getting very close to that and I think that we again, as I elaborated in one of my points, one of the things that we are really focussing on right now, is to help countries, help institutions, help the media really understand what are pandemics, and really to provide as much information as possible so we reduce the chances for any adverse effects. Adverse effects would be panic, adverse effects would be misunderstandings that may lead to actions which in the end really just cause more anxiety among people and so on. Right now we are really working pretty hard to try to get these kinds of messages, this kind of information, out to people. Again I think that we are very mindful of what is going on in Australia and a number of other countries, and I will simply say that we are getting closer.
Fergus Walsh, BBC London: It is a follow up really on Helen's question which is, I've been speaking to infectious disease experts in Australia and they have said that given that there are now over 1000 cases in Victoria, that really the pandemic has started and they pointed out to me that they are actually stopping doing community level testing in Victoria because there are so many cases, they will now just be testing people to go into hospital and a couple of people out there rather wondering why you haven't declared a pandemic when this virus is really well established in the community and it sounded from your answer that in effect – and I don't mean this as a criticism at all – but it's a question of managing the media and managing the effects of when you go to Phase VI rather than the reality of the fact that we do have widespread outbreaks in at least two WHO Regions.
Dr Fukuda: I think that the declaration of Phase changes, the movement from one Phase to another, is not simply getting up in front of press cameras or making an announcement. It is again a way to prepare the world to deal with the situation, and so what is the situation? Well, it is the spread of this virus, the disease that it is causing. In doing so, there really is a great deal of work that has to be done. This is to prepare countries so that they have the kinds of information, the knowledge, the tools to handle increased numbers of people who may be sick, to handle the kinds of enquiries coming from their population about what to do, what does this mean. And it also means trying to make sure that all the steps that can be taken, are being taken. So right now we feel that the essential steps that should be taken are underway. A lot of work is being done on communications, a lot of work is being done for example on vaccine development, a lot of work is being done on improving the antiviral supply, a lot of work is being done on developing clinical guidelines and providing updates on the science and so on, developing networks of calls where we get the clinical information and so on. All of this work is really what is needed in order for the world to deal with these kinds of situations. For WHO, the most important principle of all of this, is that the actions that we take, the announcements that we make, really are there to help people, to help countries, to make sure that we have as positive an effect as possible in making basically countries and populations as resilient as possible. This is not managing the media, this is not nuancing messages, this is really getting countries and organizations and populations ready so that they can handle and deal with this virus as well as possible. This requires a lot of effort and a lot of time and this is what is being done right now.
Jonathan Lynn, Reuters, Geneva: Dr Fukuda, I just wanted to check what you said at the very outset where you referred to 249 deaths and the figures of yesterday was only 139, that seems a very big jump, and I wanted to know if I had heard that correctly, and if so, what is the explanation for that. I had a second question as well but would you like to take that one first.
Dr Fukuda: Jonathan, let me actually ask for a verification on that and let me come back to you. Can you give me your second question.
Jonathan Lynn, Reuters: Is what you were saying about the reasons for going to level 6 and how it has to do with geographical spread and not severity, and I had the impression from what you were telling us last week and in other recent statements that the WHO is looking very much at severity and wants to incorporate that into the final declaration of a
pandemic. Have I just misunderstood that, or has there been a change in your thinking in recent days.
Dr Fukuda: Let me again try to clarify this. When we talk about the declaration of the pandemic, if we go back a few weeks ago, we were talking about how WHO had been approached by a number of countries, again through meetings such as ASEAN and at the World Health Assembly, to look at all of the information that would be needed to move from Phase 5 up to Phase 6 – a declaration of a pandemic. What we consistently heard from those meetings and the countries, as well as from a round of consultations that were held with experts from many countries, from 23 countries, as well as public health experts, was that it was important for WHO to also explain the level of severity of the current situation with any announcement about a pandemic. And the way to look at it is that we consider going out and explaining to people about the severity of the situation as an essential part of the announcement of a pandemic. However, the pandemic itself really does reflect the spread of the virus and the establishment of community level infections and activity in multiple regions. I hope that is clear. One part has to do with what does it actually mean that we have a pandemic but the severity is really critical information requested by everybody so that they can basically know how to take the news and what kinds of actions are appropriate to initiate in the countries. I hope that is clear.
Bryan Walsh, Time Magazine: Since it really seems as if the community level spread you are seeing in Australia, it does meet that definition for Phase 6, is there some threshold you are looking for in terms of this behind the scenes understanding or preparation. Are you looking for that once met you would feel more comfortable moving the definition up to Phase 6 What is it you are looking for when you are making these preparations because it seems as if your case numbers are not really the case here?
Dr Fukuda: Yes, it is not really strictly a matter of numbers. Of course, what we have stressed in the past that more important than the numbers themselves, is the establishment of spread in communities. And again, like you, we very clearly see what is going on in Australia and what we are doing is working very hard to make sure that the countries or partners, that everybody is in the best position as we get closer to a Phase declaration. As I responded to some of the earlier enquiries, I think it is fair to see that we are really getting close to this situation, but we are working very hard to make sure that everybody is as prepared as possible.
Richard Knox, National Public Radio: My connection got interrupted so I may be repeating what other people have asked and what you have already answered. I apologize. First, could you just characterize in somewhat more details what WHO is seeing in Australia and how it relates to your previous statements on the type of spread. You have for instance made a distinction before about spread that is within institutions, or expected kinds of exposures such as people in events versus wider community spread. I would just like to know how you see things in Australia. And then secondly – and other people have touched on this – but I'd just like to be as clear as we can. You know people do expect WHO to be clear and timely and they expect us to be able to explain what you are saying and I think we are all in an awkward situation at the moment. I wonder if you could give us a little bit more guidance on when you do expect to be ready to state what seems to be increasingly obvious.
Dr Fukuda: This is similar to some of the earlier questions. We were actually discussing the situation with Australia today and in Victoria, it is clear that they have been seeing outbreaks occur in both institutions such as schools, but they have also seen infections occurring in other people who are not students in these schools, and the situation has really evolved a lot over the past several days. In response to your question, we are getting really very close to knowing that we are in a pandemic situation or I think declaring that we are in a pandemic situation. Over the past week or so, when we had a discussion at the last press briefing, again I noted that we were getting closer and I think we are again much closer to that, but what we have been doing, what we have been focussing on, in the past week is really all of the preparations that we think are important for going to that kind of announcement by WHO. It is not simply a matter of just going out and saying that we are in pandemic Phase 6, it is really a matter of making sure that countries are as prepared as possible, that they have the right tools to handle the situation, the right kinds of guidance, are able to address the concerns of the populations as well as possible, with the overall goal of WHO being that everybody – countries, their populations – are really as prepared as possible for knowing that we are in a pandemic situation. For example, one of the critical issues, is that we do not want people to over-panic if they hear that we are in a pandemic situation and that they understand that the current assessment of the situation is that this is a moderate level and that, for example, countries may have a variety of options to take in terms of responding to a pandemic in a moderate situation. Again, these are some of the things that we want to make sure, get out there that people are hearing them so that there is not really a blossoming of anxiety. This is one of our concerns, that countries are not adversely affected and their people are not adversely affected by going up to Phase 6.
Jan Gold, DPA, Geneva: I just wanted to understand if you can just specify what exactly would be an adverse reaction. You keep mentioning this word “handle”, that governments have to handle. What exactly do you expect governments to do if and when apparently you declare Phase VI and what do you expect governments to do and what type of adverse reactions could possibly occur?
Dr Fukuda: First let me clarify the number that came up earlier. The number I gave you on the number of deaths was erroneous. The number of deaths is 140 so rather than the 249 – if you can make that correction – that is the number of reported deaths from this virus to WHO is 140. In terms of examples of adverse reaction that we would like to either see not occur or have them be reduced. When we first announced about this virus and the situation, there were certain actions that were taken such as questioning the safety of pork, there was culling of pigs that went on, there were trade embargoes which were issued, there were concerns about travellers coming from certain areas, and there was concern over border closures or travel restrictions... a lot of those kinds of questions came up. These are the kinds of potential adverse facts that you can have if you go out without making sure that people understand the situation as well as possible. In earlier outbreaks, in earlier pandemics, we have often seen that people who are in the category of being worried, but who were not particularly sick, have overrun hospitals, that sometimes the number of patients can lead to a dysfunction in the health system, simply because there are so many people going to emergency rooms and this can adversely affect people who in fact requires those emergency facilities. There is a potential number of
consequences like that, that we would like to really make sure that the chances are minimized. These are some of the potential consequences that we are trying to reduce the chances for.
Aline Gobert, CBC: What is happening in the Indian community in Canada, in the First Nation community? Is it just a question of maybe means, the fact that those populations are very poor, or could it be some racial or some genes among First Nations in Canada that could be of the same far away family than the Mexican people who were sick also?
Dr Fukuda: What we can say is that when we look at past pandemics, we know that some groups of people, some populations have been particularly hit hard. For example, in some of the earlier pandemics, pregnant women have been a population that was hit very hard, much harder than most people, than most groups of people. We also know that outbreaks of regular influenza, in some communities, the effects can very severe. We have seen outbreaks of seasonal influenza take place in some African communities with the effect that significant numbers of children died, and significant numbers of older people died and in those instances, it is not really so clear what specific factors increase the disease and the severity in the populations: what is poverty, what is some other underlying disease, it is often not very clear. In terms of the Inuit population, we know for example that some of the background level of chronic diseases can be higher in this population. These have occurred in villages that are relatively isolated although there are good health care services available. At this time we can say that we know a larger number than expected of young Inuit people did developed serious illnesses and had to get hospitalized. I do not think we know whether this reflects one characteristic, whether it reflects socio-economic factors, whether it reflects genetic factors, whether it reflects chronic underlying diseases. This is not possible to say at this time. We do know that in past pandemics, Inuit populations were very severely hit, and this is why these reports raise such concern to us. That is about the level of information that we have right now.
Maria Chang, Associated Press: I was wondering if you could clarify where WHO is in terms of redefining the criteria for Phase 6? You mentioned a couple of weeks ago that you were going to re-examine if there should be other things like severity, and now you sort of partly address that and I wonder where we stand with that and if there is going to be a new definition? And secondly am wondering if there is any concern at WHO that there may be community spread happening in certain countries in Europe, like say Britain, that are not reporting, are not testing for it. Do you think you are getting accurate information from these countries?
Dr Fukuda: In terms of redefining Phase 6, what we have decided to do is not so much “redefine” Phase 6, but to stay with the current criteria, really to augment the information provided when an announcement is made to Phase 6. Augmenting it really means coming out and explaining what we consider to be the severity of the pandemic, and also to come out with information for countries in terms of how to tailor them some of responses to the pandemic situation, which may differ from the pre-existing national plans. One of the issues that countries have been struggling with right now is that many of their existing pandemic plans where really based on a more severe scenario – the spread of the H5N1 virus – and some of the actions which their plans call for may be inappropriate. One of the things that we would like to do is, in addition to making any announcement about going to Phase 6, also discuss the severity of the situation, and also provide guidance to countries about how to modify and tailor the response actions to meet the current situation, and not to be so locked into by the pre-existing plans. In terms of Europe, we know that the situation has been ongoing and continuing in some of the key countries. There has been a lot of attention being paid to the UK and to Spain over the past several weeks, both by the media as well as by the countries themselves, but in fact there is infection in a number of countries and reported by a number of countries in Europe. Our primary concern is not so much the numbers that are being reported. All of the countries without exception are working really quite hard to get a sense of what the situation in a country is and to report that information to WHO. It is really quite a different situation that we have seen in some of the other global and big outbreaks in the past. Countries are really working very hard to provide whatever information they can. Our biggest concern is whether the recommendations, whether the actions being taken by countries should be underway to handle the situation right now, and so whether the information that is being provided by countries, whether the actions being taken to develop important tools such as vaccines are underway. That is really where at WHO our primary focus is on. Are the critical public health actions being undertaken? In here we feel pretty comfortable that what can be done is really being pushed forward right now.
Dick Thompson: Welcome to the WHO 5 o'clock virtual press briefing. Today’s briefing, Tuesday 9 June, is an update of influenza A(H1N1) situation with Dr Keiji Fukuda. We will start with a statement by Dr Fukuda and then we will take your questions. I would now like to hand over to Dr Keiji Fukuda.
Dr Fukuda: As usual with this briefing, I will do a quick update then there are some issues that I will highlight, and then I will throw it open to questions. As of today, which is 9 June 2009, the number of countries reporting laboratory-confirmed cases to WHO is 73 and the number of laboratory-confirmed cases reported to WHO is 26 563. This is a little bit more advanced than the numbers that are posted on the web right now. In these cases, this includes 249 deaths (this was an error and was corrected later). In terms of what we are seeing right now, we continue to see the spread of this virus evolve and we continue to see new countries report the virus, and we continue to see evolution of activity within countries. As we have for the past several weeks, we continue to see ongoing infection occur within community in North America but we also have increasing reports of activity occurring in the Southern Hemisphere, particularly from South America and countries such as Chile, as well as from other countries, such as Australia. We know that Australia, for example, is seeing a great deal of activity in Victoria at the community level. In addition, similar to the activity in previous weeks, we continue to note that there is activity going on in Europe. In terms of the virus, at this point, it is fair to say that the virus that we are seeing is relatively the same as the virus that we saw several weeks ago and there are no major changes to report at this time. The virus continues to be sensitive to oseltamavir and zanamivir, two antivirals drugs usually against this virus. In terms of the epidemiology, we continue to see that the majority of infections are occurring in younger age groups, people younger than 60 and this is not exclusive. There are infections that are occurring in older people. In terms of the clinical picture, what we are seeing in the southern hemisphere is similar to what has been reported from the northern hemisphere. That is, most of the people who have gotten infected have self-limiting illness which can be taken care of at home, or without specialized medical care and these people recover. However, as noted, there have been a number of serious cases – typically these are pneumonia cases or cases of respiratory failure sometimes requiring ventilators, sometimes ending in fatalities. Much of the earlier epidemiology of this situation was characterized by seeing infections occur in travellers, in institutions such as schools, sometimes military institutions and cruise ships. As we see the situation evolved, we know that outbreaks can occur in communities. And again this is the overall pattern that we are seeing. There are some examples, however, that we are paying very close attention to. For example, up in Canada, we know that there are reports of infections occurring in Inuit communities with a disproportionate number of serious cases occurring. These are observations of concern to us. Now, there have been a number of questions which have been posed to WHO over the past weeks since we last had a press briefing, so what I would like to is go for a couple of them. For example, one of the most basic questions that has come up is simply “What is a pandemic?” So here let me review what we are seeing and why we consider this situation which is potentially evolving into a pandemic. What we are seeing right now is the emergence of a new influenza virus that has not been previously known to infect people. What that means is that most people in the world really have very little background immunity to such a virus. We are seeing that this virus is spreading rapidly around the world, again the characteristics of previous pandemic viruses, and we are also seeing that the disease patterns caused by this virus are not what we see for seasonal influenza. For example, in the northern hemisphere we have seen a great deal of activity occurring in the summer months, and we also have seen that most of the infections are occurring in younger people with the serious complications also occurring in the younger people. Again these are patterns which are not what we see with normal seasonal influenza. When you put all of these things together, what it really suggests is that we are in a situation which is really moving towards more or less a pandemic type of situation. The pandemic really refers to the fact that we are seeing the geographical spread of a virus that is causing this disease. The second question that has come up is about the name of the virus. We know that the situation has been confusing. For example, right now, we know that there are H1N1 viruses which have been circulating in people for a number of years. This is a new H1N1 virus. And we also know that there had been H1N1 viruses which had been circulating in swine or in pigs for many years. And this has really led to a complicated situation of what you call a new virus. One of the primary concerns and one of the difficulties of naming such a new virus is to avoid adverse effects, or stigma associated with a virus name, especially if it causes some unwanted effects in either some sector or in some groups of people. For example, we have seen in association with this outbreak concerns about food, concerns about pigs, which for our practical purposes are not warranted. Food has been perfectly safe, pork meat has not posed a danger for people, yet there has been a fair amount of anxiety associated with the virus originating in pigs and so to call this a swine flu virus is something that is really has a lot of potential for causing greater anxiety associated with eating pork or with these animals which is unwarranted. We have also seen that in past pandemics, the naming of viruses associated with geographical locations can often lead to a stigma and erroneous association that somehow the virus is more dangerous in an area, or perhaps associated with an area. This can manifest itself by travel restrictions or travel concerns that may not be warranted. And so again, in approaching the whole issue of naming the virus, these are some of the issues with which many people – not just WHO – but many people in scientific societies and different groups have been wrestling with. We hope to come up with names that are easy enough to remember, easy enough to use but really do not cause harm for either people or for sectors. This is one of the issues that has been wrestled with right now. Another question that has come up is that “Are we in Phase 6 now, or why haven't we declare Phase 6 now?" In here I think I simply want to say that we know that the virus is spreading and we are now seeing that activity is picking up in a number of countries and this is, as I had mentioned before last week, we know that we are getting closer to probably a pandemic situation. But in the period of time since we last discussed this, I want you to know that WHO has been working extremely hard in terms of preparing countries, in terms of preparing populations for what a potential move to Phase 6 or pandemic would entail. For example, there is work that is being undertaken right now so people understand really what does a pandemic mean, what does going to Phase 6 mean? Does this mean that we are seeing something really severe change? Does this mean that there is a need for drastic actions to be taken? And here I want to point out that by going to Phase 6, what this would mean is that spread of the virus has continued and that activity has become established in at least two regions of the world. It does not mean that the severity of the situation has increased and that people are getting seriously sick at higher numbers or higher rates than they are right now. This is a very important point for countries to understand, for the media to understand, even if it is a little bit paradoxical. You would think that by going up scale would mean that the level of concern should go up, but really what the going up a scale would mean is that we are seeing greater spread of the virus. We are working with different groups to make sure these kinds of messages are understood and the difference between severity and geographical spread is understood. As I discussed last week, right at this time, we considered the situation and the impact on countries to be relatively moderate, and this is again a critical point. If there are some uncertainties, I hope you come back with questions on this. One of the other things that is very important to understand and there has been a number questions about this, are changes over time. We are, as we have pointed out, I think a number of times in the past, at the beginning of the spread of this virus. Unless this virus suddenly disappears overnight, it is likely that the spread of this virus will continue and that activity will increase in some countries and go up and down in other countries. Now we know from past pandemics that in these kinds of situations, we can expect potential changes as we go through different populations and overtime. What does this mean? Well, it means that if we see spread of this virus into populations which are especially vulnerable, it means we may see more severe disease than we would see in populations which are relatively well off. I think the current reports coming from Canada about what has been seen in some of the Inuit villages is a good example of this. These are some of the potential changes that we know we could see as the virus moves through the southern hemisphere, different kinds of changes may happen overtime. If we look to the past, we see that how the outbreaks have behaved early on in a pandemic can be different than how the outbreaks occur later in the year, and months later. Again this whole concept that situation can change is important for everybody to understand because things may need to change, may need to be adapted, actions to be taken by countries and by people, and so on if situations change. The last point that I will cover before we throw it open for questions is really another difficult issue. This simply has to do with uncertainties. Whenever we see a new disease, whenever we see any kind of large series of outbreaks caused by viruses that are new to the scene, we are in a period of great uncertainty. This is true of the current period right now. One of the difficulties for decision-makers and countries and public health institutions is that they need to make decisions, they need to move ahead even though many things are not so clear or are not known. To give you an example, right now, we know what the impact of the virus has been up to now in countries that are relatively developed, or in a number of other countries in which the number of infections has been relatively small. But we do not know what the impact on the population would be as the numbers of infected people grow in populations, for example, in Africa or other continents where they may be large numbers of vulnerable people. We also do not know how this virus is going to evolve. It could become more mild over time, or it could become more severe over time, or it could stay pretty much as it is now. These are uncertainties that we have to take into account but we really do not know how that is going to go forward. Finally, we also do not know how in this global era in which there is so much media coverage, how populations will respond if we move to a pandemic situation, or a pandemic declaration. For example, will the kinds of information being provided by countries and by media really be enough to address the anxieties of people or will people feel more anxious in this situation, and then how would they behave? These are really important considerations for public health authorities and for people who are working to make sure we have balanced an approach and a balanced response to handling the situation as possible. So at this current period right now, as we see the situation evolve, I can just summarize that WHO and its many partners, the Member States, the many public health institutions we are working with are really working to make sure that as the situation evolves we take all possible steps to reduce any adverse effects, any unwanted actions associated with uncertainties of a pandemic situation. With that let me stop and then let us throw it open for questions.
David Brown, The Washington Post: I am wondering if you can talk a little bit about the deaths and hospitalizations among people who do not have underlying medical risk situations or states that put them at higher risk? And I am wondering if there is any entity that is trying to sort of aggregate those serious cases that do not have underlying complications to try to see what might be going on, what obvious, or if there are any risk factors that can be elucidated that are not obvious ones?
Dr Fukuda: Even though the proportion of people dying who were previously healthy with those who are dying with some kinds of pre-existing medical conditions vary somewhat from location to location. It is probably fair to say that approximately half the people who have died from this H1N1 infection have been previously healthy people. This is one of the observations that has given us the most concern. I think that some weeks ago there was a lot of push by different groups to say that the pandemic was mild, that the disease was mild, but from the outset and from the reports coming from Mexico, we knew that a number of the deaths had taken place among younger people who were previously healthy. This is a kind of pattern that we have seen with the H5N1 virus, this is a pattern and a consequence that we have seen in earlier pandemics and so it did and it continues to give us a great deal of concern. Among those people who have died – or previously healthy people who have died – from this viral infection, we know that some of them have died with clinical pictures consistent with respiratory failure, probably consistent with viral pneumonia. That is when the virus itself directly infects the lungs and causes infection, as opposed to secondary bacterial infections. But I do not think we know really why did those people die as opposed to the many other people who recovered, what kinds of underlying factors led to fatal illnesses. There are a number of institutions, a number of physicians who are looking at these cases and trying to understand if there anything that can be uncovered which provides some clues as to why some previously healthy people end up having fatal infections. Right now it is not possible to point out what may distinguish that group from other healthy people.
Helen Branswell, the Canadian Press: Dr Fukuda, at the beginning of your remarks you said that in Australia a great deal of activity is being seen in Victoria at the community level. Why then has the WHO not declared a pandemic, is there any doubt in your mind that this is a pandemic at this point?
Dr Fukuda: I think that we are really getting very close to that and I think that we again, as I elaborated in one of my points, one of the things that we are really focussing on right now, is to help countries, help institutions, help the media really understand what are pandemics, and really to provide as much information as possible so we reduce the chances for any adverse effects. Adverse effects would be panic, adverse effects would be misunderstandings that may lead to actions which in the end really just cause more anxiety among people and so on. Right now we are really working pretty hard to try to get these kinds of messages, this kind of information, out to people. Again I think that we are very mindful of what is going on in Australia and a number of other countries, and I will simply say that we are getting closer.
Fergus Walsh, BBC London: It is a follow up really on Helen's question which is, I've been speaking to infectious disease experts in Australia and they have said that given that there are now over 1000 cases in Victoria, that really the pandemic has started and they pointed out to me that they are actually stopping doing community level testing in Victoria because there are so many cases, they will now just be testing people to go into hospital and a couple of people out there rather wondering why you haven't declared a pandemic when this virus is really well established in the community and it sounded from your answer that in effect – and I don't mean this as a criticism at all – but it's a question of managing the media and managing the effects of when you go to Phase VI rather than the reality of the fact that we do have widespread outbreaks in at least two WHO Regions.
Dr Fukuda: I think that the declaration of Phase changes, the movement from one Phase to another, is not simply getting up in front of press cameras or making an announcement. It is again a way to prepare the world to deal with the situation, and so what is the situation? Well, it is the spread of this virus, the disease that it is causing. In doing so, there really is a great deal of work that has to be done. This is to prepare countries so that they have the kinds of information, the knowledge, the tools to handle increased numbers of people who may be sick, to handle the kinds of enquiries coming from their population about what to do, what does this mean. And it also means trying to make sure that all the steps that can be taken, are being taken. So right now we feel that the essential steps that should be taken are underway. A lot of work is being done on communications, a lot of work is being done for example on vaccine development, a lot of work is being done on improving the antiviral supply, a lot of work is being done on developing clinical guidelines and providing updates on the science and so on, developing networks of calls where we get the clinical information and so on. All of this work is really what is needed in order for the world to deal with these kinds of situations. For WHO, the most important principle of all of this, is that the actions that we take, the announcements that we make, really are there to help people, to help countries, to make sure that we have as positive an effect as possible in making basically countries and populations as resilient as possible. This is not managing the media, this is not nuancing messages, this is really getting countries and organizations and populations ready so that they can handle and deal with this virus as well as possible. This requires a lot of effort and a lot of time and this is what is being done right now.
Jonathan Lynn, Reuters, Geneva: Dr Fukuda, I just wanted to check what you said at the very outset where you referred to 249 deaths and the figures of yesterday was only 139, that seems a very big jump, and I wanted to know if I had heard that correctly, and if so, what is the explanation for that. I had a second question as well but would you like to take that one first.
Dr Fukuda: Jonathan, let me actually ask for a verification on that and let me come back to you. Can you give me your second question.
Jonathan Lynn, Reuters: Is what you were saying about the reasons for going to level 6 and how it has to do with geographical spread and not severity, and I had the impression from what you were telling us last week and in other recent statements that the WHO is looking very much at severity and wants to incorporate that into the final declaration of a
pandemic. Have I just misunderstood that, or has there been a change in your thinking in recent days.
Dr Fukuda: Let me again try to clarify this. When we talk about the declaration of the pandemic, if we go back a few weeks ago, we were talking about how WHO had been approached by a number of countries, again through meetings such as ASEAN and at the World Health Assembly, to look at all of the information that would be needed to move from Phase 5 up to Phase 6 – a declaration of a pandemic. What we consistently heard from those meetings and the countries, as well as from a round of consultations that were held with experts from many countries, from 23 countries, as well as public health experts, was that it was important for WHO to also explain the level of severity of the current situation with any announcement about a pandemic. And the way to look at it is that we consider going out and explaining to people about the severity of the situation as an essential part of the announcement of a pandemic. However, the pandemic itself really does reflect the spread of the virus and the establishment of community level infections and activity in multiple regions. I hope that is clear. One part has to do with what does it actually mean that we have a pandemic but the severity is really critical information requested by everybody so that they can basically know how to take the news and what kinds of actions are appropriate to initiate in the countries. I hope that is clear.
Bryan Walsh, Time Magazine: Since it really seems as if the community level spread you are seeing in Australia, it does meet that definition for Phase 6, is there some threshold you are looking for in terms of this behind the scenes understanding or preparation. Are you looking for that once met you would feel more comfortable moving the definition up to Phase 6 What is it you are looking for when you are making these preparations because it seems as if your case numbers are not really the case here?
Dr Fukuda: Yes, it is not really strictly a matter of numbers. Of course, what we have stressed in the past that more important than the numbers themselves, is the establishment of spread in communities. And again, like you, we very clearly see what is going on in Australia and what we are doing is working very hard to make sure that the countries or partners, that everybody is in the best position as we get closer to a Phase declaration. As I responded to some of the earlier enquiries, I think it is fair to see that we are really getting close to this situation, but we are working very hard to make sure that everybody is as prepared as possible.
Richard Knox, National Public Radio: My connection got interrupted so I may be repeating what other people have asked and what you have already answered. I apologize. First, could you just characterize in somewhat more details what WHO is seeing in Australia and how it relates to your previous statements on the type of spread. You have for instance made a distinction before about spread that is within institutions, or expected kinds of exposures such as people in events versus wider community spread. I would just like to know how you see things in Australia. And then secondly – and other people have touched on this – but I'd just like to be as clear as we can. You know people do expect WHO to be clear and timely and they expect us to be able to explain what you are saying and I think we are all in an awkward situation at the moment. I wonder if you could give us a little bit more guidance on when you do expect to be ready to state what seems to be increasingly obvious.
Dr Fukuda: This is similar to some of the earlier questions. We were actually discussing the situation with Australia today and in Victoria, it is clear that they have been seeing outbreaks occur in both institutions such as schools, but they have also seen infections occurring in other people who are not students in these schools, and the situation has really evolved a lot over the past several days. In response to your question, we are getting really very close to knowing that we are in a pandemic situation or I think declaring that we are in a pandemic situation. Over the past week or so, when we had a discussion at the last press briefing, again I noted that we were getting closer and I think we are again much closer to that, but what we have been doing, what we have been focussing on, in the past week is really all of the preparations that we think are important for going to that kind of announcement by WHO. It is not simply a matter of just going out and saying that we are in pandemic Phase 6, it is really a matter of making sure that countries are as prepared as possible, that they have the right tools to handle the situation, the right kinds of guidance, are able to address the concerns of the populations as well as possible, with the overall goal of WHO being that everybody – countries, their populations – are really as prepared as possible for knowing that we are in a pandemic situation. For example, one of the critical issues, is that we do not want people to over-panic if they hear that we are in a pandemic situation and that they understand that the current assessment of the situation is that this is a moderate level and that, for example, countries may have a variety of options to take in terms of responding to a pandemic in a moderate situation. Again, these are some of the things that we want to make sure, get out there that people are hearing them so that there is not really a blossoming of anxiety. This is one of our concerns, that countries are not adversely affected and their people are not adversely affected by going up to Phase 6.
Jan Gold, DPA, Geneva: I just wanted to understand if you can just specify what exactly would be an adverse reaction. You keep mentioning this word “handle”, that governments have to handle. What exactly do you expect governments to do if and when apparently you declare Phase VI and what do you expect governments to do and what type of adverse reactions could possibly occur?
Dr Fukuda: First let me clarify the number that came up earlier. The number I gave you on the number of deaths was erroneous. The number of deaths is 140 so rather than the 249 – if you can make that correction – that is the number of reported deaths from this virus to WHO is 140. In terms of examples of adverse reaction that we would like to either see not occur or have them be reduced. When we first announced about this virus and the situation, there were certain actions that were taken such as questioning the safety of pork, there was culling of pigs that went on, there were trade embargoes which were issued, there were concerns about travellers coming from certain areas, and there was concern over border closures or travel restrictions... a lot of those kinds of questions came up. These are the kinds of potential adverse facts that you can have if you go out without making sure that people understand the situation as well as possible. In earlier outbreaks, in earlier pandemics, we have often seen that people who are in the category of being worried, but who were not particularly sick, have overrun hospitals, that sometimes the number of patients can lead to a dysfunction in the health system, simply because there are so many people going to emergency rooms and this can adversely affect people who in fact requires those emergency facilities. There is a potential number of
consequences like that, that we would like to really make sure that the chances are minimized. These are some of the potential consequences that we are trying to reduce the chances for.
Aline Gobert, CBC: What is happening in the Indian community in Canada, in the First Nation community? Is it just a question of maybe means, the fact that those populations are very poor, or could it be some racial or some genes among First Nations in Canada that could be of the same far away family than the Mexican people who were sick also?
Dr Fukuda: What we can say is that when we look at past pandemics, we know that some groups of people, some populations have been particularly hit hard. For example, in some of the earlier pandemics, pregnant women have been a population that was hit very hard, much harder than most people, than most groups of people. We also know that outbreaks of regular influenza, in some communities, the effects can very severe. We have seen outbreaks of seasonal influenza take place in some African communities with the effect that significant numbers of children died, and significant numbers of older people died and in those instances, it is not really so clear what specific factors increase the disease and the severity in the populations: what is poverty, what is some other underlying disease, it is often not very clear. In terms of the Inuit population, we know for example that some of the background level of chronic diseases can be higher in this population. These have occurred in villages that are relatively isolated although there are good health care services available. At this time we can say that we know a larger number than expected of young Inuit people did developed serious illnesses and had to get hospitalized. I do not think we know whether this reflects one characteristic, whether it reflects socio-economic factors, whether it reflects genetic factors, whether it reflects chronic underlying diseases. This is not possible to say at this time. We do know that in past pandemics, Inuit populations were very severely hit, and this is why these reports raise such concern to us. That is about the level of information that we have right now.
Maria Chang, Associated Press: I was wondering if you could clarify where WHO is in terms of redefining the criteria for Phase 6? You mentioned a couple of weeks ago that you were going to re-examine if there should be other things like severity, and now you sort of partly address that and I wonder where we stand with that and if there is going to be a new definition? And secondly am wondering if there is any concern at WHO that there may be community spread happening in certain countries in Europe, like say Britain, that are not reporting, are not testing for it. Do you think you are getting accurate information from these countries?
Dr Fukuda: In terms of redefining Phase 6, what we have decided to do is not so much “redefine” Phase 6, but to stay with the current criteria, really to augment the information provided when an announcement is made to Phase 6. Augmenting it really means coming out and explaining what we consider to be the severity of the pandemic, and also to come out with information for countries in terms of how to tailor them some of responses to the pandemic situation, which may differ from the pre-existing national plans. One of the issues that countries have been struggling with right now is that many of their existing pandemic plans where really based on a more severe scenario – the spread of the H5N1 virus – and some of the actions which their plans call for may be inappropriate. One of the things that we would like to do is, in addition to making any announcement about going to Phase 6, also discuss the severity of the situation, and also provide guidance to countries about how to modify and tailor the response actions to meet the current situation, and not to be so locked into by the pre-existing plans. In terms of Europe, we know that the situation has been ongoing and continuing in some of the key countries. There has been a lot of attention being paid to the UK and to Spain over the past several weeks, both by the media as well as by the countries themselves, but in fact there is infection in a number of countries and reported by a number of countries in Europe. Our primary concern is not so much the numbers that are being reported. All of the countries without exception are working really quite hard to get a sense of what the situation in a country is and to report that information to WHO. It is really quite a different situation that we have seen in some of the other global and big outbreaks in the past. Countries are really working very hard to provide whatever information they can. Our biggest concern is whether the recommendations, whether the actions being taken by countries should be underway to handle the situation right now, and so whether the information that is being provided by countries, whether the actions being taken to develop important tools such as vaccines are underway. That is really where at WHO our primary focus is on. Are the critical public health actions being undertaken? In here we feel pretty comfortable that what can be done is really being pushed forward right now.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)