Rains fuel swine flu, 13 dead in a week

NEW DELHI - With the onset of Monsoon, the deadly swine flu has intensified in the country with over 13 deaths being reported in the last one week, an official said Tuesday.

The total number of cases reported in the last week — since June 15 — is 233.

While Kerala remains the worst-hit, the threat is becoming grave in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh as Monsoon has already set over these states.

“It was already known that Monsoon will intensify the number of cases. We are prepared to handle the threat with adequate doses of Tamiflu and vaccines available,” a health ministry official said.

“We will have three more indigenous vaccines by August-end,” the official added.

Kerala registered nine swine flu deaths in the last one week. In the week before that 14 deaths were reported.

Altogether the virus has claimed 13 lives since June 15, taking the cumulative number of deaths to 1,567 since the outbreak of swine flue in the country in the middle of last year.

In the last seven days, the number of lab-confirmed cases in Kerala increased to 177 as compared to 141 the week before. Doses of Tamiflu and swine flu vaccines have already been dispatched to the state, the official said.

Kerala authorities maintain that the cases have been restricted to two districts of Trivandrum and Kollam, the official said.

During the last week, Maharashtra reported three deaths while Andhra Pradesh reported one due to the flu.

High temperatures in Delhi have so far kept swine flu cases under check. Only two cases were reported from Delhi last week.

Official sources said that since the flu outbreak last year, samples from 141,882 people have been tested in government and private laboratories in the country. Of these 32,458 have been found positive.