GENEVA, Switzerland, May 19, 2009 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Forty countries have
officially reported 9,830 cases of H1N1 flu, including 79 deaths, the World
Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, said Tuesday.
The H1N1 flu, formerly known as swine flu, presented mainly mild cases outside
the outbreak in Mexico, said Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO director general when
addressing the 62nd World Health Assembly in Geneva last week. Mexican health
officials blamed H1N1 flu for the deaths of more than 150 people.
The H1N1 virus spreads easily from person to person and rapidly within a country
once it is established.
"We expect this pattern to continue," Chan said.
She defended elevating the pandemic threat to Phase 5 on a six-phase scale,
saying it activated a number of preparedness measures and saw public health
services, laboratories, WHO staff, and industry officials working around the
clock.
"A defining characteristic of a pandemic is the almost universal vulnerability
of the world's population to infection," Chan said. "Not all people become
infected, but nearly all people are at risk."
Health service scientists "are trying to get some answers to a number of
questions that will strengthen risk assessment and allow me to issue more
precise advice to governments," Chan told the gathering.
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