Thailand's swine flu death toll rose to 18 Sunday as the government confirmed three more fatalities and opened a vaccine plant to prevent tens of thousands of infections across the country.
The latest confirmed deaths from the A(H1N1) virus were of a 45-year-old man in the central province of Ayutthaya, a 19-year-old man in southern Krabi province and a 24-year-old woman in Bangkok.
The woman was described as overweight, as was the older man, who also suffered from kidney failure, high blood pressure, a lung infection and leptospirosis, according to the public health ministry.
Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said that Thai people "should not be complacent but we will not panic", before he travelled south of the capital to open the country's first swine flu vaccination pilot plant.
"Anyone who does not have immunity could be infected," he said. "I am convinced that our confirmed cases could reach tens of thousands or perhaps hundreds of thousands."
The first two million doses of vaccine were expected to be ready by January at the latest, the public health minister Witthaya Keawparadai said.
He said his ministry would double its work in order to halve the predicted number of flu fatalities in Thailand this year, currently expected to reach 1,200.
Across the kingdom 247 new cases of swine flu were confirmed, bringing the total to 3,555.
bc/ask/rob/elw
Health-flu-Thailand
AFP 121100 GMT 07 09
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