Article 1
Asia's first swine-flu case confirmed in Hong Kong - Update
Posted : Fri, 01 May 2009 14:05:42 GMT
Hong Kong - Asia's first case of swine flu has been confirmed in Hong Kong, the territory's leader, Donald Tsang, announced Friday. The patient is a visitor from Mexico, the worst-hit country in the swine-flu outbreak, who travelled to Hong Kong from Shanghai Thursday and was staying at a hotel in the city's Wan Chai district.
The patient has been taken to the city's Ruttonjee Hospital and was in stable condition Friday evening, Chief Executive Tsang said at a press briefing Friday night.
The hotel where the patient was staying, the Metropark, has been quarantined with all guests barred from leaving, reporters were told.
Guests staying at the hotel told the government-run radio station RTHK that no one was being allowed to leave or enter the hotel.
Tsang announced the case after a meeting of top government officials was convened Friday afternoon in response to news of the confirmed case.
The Hong Kong leader appealed to the public not to panic and said everything would be done to prevent the virus from spreading in the city of 7 million.
Hong Kong has raised its swine-flu alert level from "serious" to "emergency" in response to the confirmation of the case. Details of the heightened measures were due to be announced later.
Schools were to remain open and public gatherings and exhibitions were to continue as normal but under more stringent hygiene measures, Tsang said in advance of the details being released.
News of the case came after Tsang warned earlier this week that Hong Kong was at a greater risk of a swine-flu outbreak because it is one of the world's most densely populated cities.
Before Hong Kong's announcement of its case, the World Health Organization said Friday that 331 human cases of swine flu have been reported in 11 countries. Ten cases have been fatal - nine in Mexico and one in the United States.
Ironically, the first case of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, in Hong Kong in 2003 was traced back to a patient from China staying in another hotel in the city.
A total of 299 people died and about 1,800 were infected with the SARS virus in the city of 7 million, and the virus spread from Hong Kong around the world.
_____________________________________________
Article 2
Asia Seeks to Stem Contagion as Swine Flu Spreads (Update3)
By Heejin Koo and Hanny Wan
May 2 (Bloomberg) -- South Korea confirmed its first case of swine flu one day after a patient in Hong Kong was diagnosed with the disease, as Asian health officials battle to contain a virus that has spread to 15 nations on three continents.
“After a period of cell cultivation, we have deemed that the patient has contracted the virus,” Lee Jong Koo, director of the Korea Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, told reporters today in Seoul.
South Korea this week raised its alert status, issued a travel warning on Mexico, tightened checks on inbound travelers and boosted inspections of pork products. Hong Kong declared a public emergency after confirming its first case yesterday, one day after the World Health Organization said it may soon declare the world’s first influenza pandemic since 1968.
Hong Kong’s first swine flu patient is a man who arrived from Mexico on April 30, Chief Executive Donald Tsang said yesterday, urging the public not to panic. The government said today it moved 12 guests of the Metro Park Hotel, where the man stayed, to a holiday village prepared as a quarantine center.
Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control told 24 people who traveled on the same Shanghai-to-Hong Kong flight and later returned to Taiwan to quarantine themselves until May 7, according to a statement last night. It also raised the travel alert for Hong Kong to yellow, the lowest of a three-scale rating.
Hundreds more cases of swine flu are suspected in New York, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand.
The virus, known formally as influenza A (H1N1), is confirmed to have infected more than 350 people with 10 deaths, according to the WHO’s Website. The symptoms of the disease may be no more severe than seasonal flu ailments, world health officials said.
South Korean Nun
A 51-year-old South Korean nun, who returned to Korea on April 26 from a week of aid activities in Mexico, is being treated at a military hospital in Gyeonggi province, outside the capital city of Seoul.
“Her fever, coughing and other symptoms have cleared,” said Choi Kang Won, the doctor in charge of her care. “She’s been treated with Tamiflu, and we’ll discuss the possibility of releasing her after this weekend.”
The patient may be released from the hospital as early as tomorrow, Yonhap News reported, without saying where it obtained the information. KCDC officials declined to confirm the report.
Another South Korean “probable” swine flu patient is a 44-year-old nun who may have been infected by her colleague in the nation’s first case of secondary contagion, Lee said.
Masks & Soap
South Korea’s customs officers at Incheon International Airport and other airports and shipping ports have tightened the screening process for travelers and disinfection procedures on carriers and ships, Prime Minister Han Seung Soo’s office said in an e-mailed statement today.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry announced late yesterday it will provide $500,000 worth of emergency medical aid to Mexico, including masks, thermometers and disinfectant liquid soap.
The 25-year-old Mexican patient in Hong Kong is in Ruttonjee Hospital in the city’s Wan Chai district, Tsang said.
A man wearing a surgical mask was seen carrying boxes labeled “Tamiflu” into the lobby of the Metro Park Hotel. Hong Kong has 20 million doses of Tamiflu, made by Roche Holding AG, and other anti-flu medicines in stock, the South China Morning Post reported April 27.
Hong Kong pledged to step up measures to contain swine flu after guests at a second local hotel were suspected of having the virus.
Hotel Guests
Some guests in L’hotel Nina et Convention Centre in Tsuen Wan are being examined after showing signs of fever, Lam Ping- yan, the city’s director of health, told legislators at a meeting today broadcast on Cable TV, without providing details.
Six or seven hotel guests were examined because they were on the same flight as the Mexican man, said Kelvin Shum, assistant front office manager at L’hotel Nina. They have no symptoms and the hotel remains open, he added.
The city’s international airport and all border check points will pay special attention to all Mexican-passport holders and give them health inspections, York Chow, the city’s health secretary, told legislators in Hong Kong today. The government will make announcements by tomorrow on whether schools will be closed from Monday, he said.
Asia is better prepared to respond to an outbreak of the swine flu virus, after its experiences with severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, and avian flu, Asian Development Bank Managing Director Rajat Nag said. SARS killed 299 people in Hong Kong in 2003.
“It’s an evolving situation but systems are in place to deal with it,” Nag said. “We have to watch very carefully but not overreact.”
Suspended Flights
China has suspended direct flights from Mexico to Shanghai on concern travelers may transmit swine flu, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today in a statement posted on its Web site. Resumption of flights will depend on how well the danger of a viral pandemic is controlled, it said.
The Chinese government may send a chartered flight to bring home Chinese who were scheduled to fly to Shanghai from Mexico City on May 3, the ministry said.
Health authorities in China’s southern Guangdong province are seeking to contact 11 people who were on the same flight as the Mexican patient in Hong Kong and have not yet been identified, according to a notice today from the provincial health bureau.
Test Results
In Japan, a Tokyo laboratory is testing to determine if an infant at a U.S. military base is infected with the swine flu virus. Specimens from the baby have been sent to labs in Japan and the U.S., and the hospital at Yokota Air Base in suburban Tokyo is awaiting results.
New Zealand, which has reported four confirmed cases of swine flu, cut the number of suspected cases to 101 from 116, the Ministry of Health said in a statement. There are 269 people in isolation being treated with Tamiflu, down from 388 on Friday.
______________________________________________
Article 3
Some travellers cancelling plans over swine flu fears
Tom Spender
Last Updated: May 02. 2009 12:16AM UAE / May 1. 2009 8:16PM GMT
ABU DHABI // Some people are cancelling overseas trips for fear of contacting swine flu, a travel industry insider said yesterday.
“We have seen eight cancellations so far and expect between 30 and 50 more per month, depending on how the pandemic develops,” said Hermant Gupta, the travel insurance manager for the Gulf region for the insurance company AXA.
The travellers had planned trips to Mexico, where swine flu was first detected, Canada, which yesterday had 35 confirmed cases, and Thailand, which has not yet reported any cases, he said.
However, most people are still continuing with their planned international trips, Mr Gupta said, noting that there had been no discernible drop in the number of travel insurance policies being taken out.
“It’s really too early to say how this will pan out. We’ll see what happens over the next month.”
Although Asia only reported its first case of swine flu yesterday, with a Mexican national in Hong Kong admitted to hospital there, Mr Gupta said East Asian countries were also a concern for travellers. Swine flu has now reached 12 countries on three continents but is killing fewer people than past such outbreaks, health officials said yesterday.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Thursday raised the pandemic alert level to phase five, indicating that the world’s first influenza pandemic since 1968 may soon be declared.
The UN agency has urged countries to make final preparations against the disease, but has not yet recommended restrictions on regular travel because it would not slow the spread of the flu, or the closure of borders. It is advising people who are ill to delay international travel.
A delegation from the UAE, including the Minister of Health, Humaid al Qattami, will take part in an emergency meeting of health ministers of member states of the GCC today in Doha to discuss a unified strategy of dealing with the influenza strain, which is also known as H1N1.
Meanwhile, as of yesterday, the nation’s busiest airport, Dubai International Airport, had yet to install thermal-imaging machines, which can help identify cases of the flu by detecting whether people walking past them have a high fever, an airport spokesman said.
The machines have been hastily set up in airports across the globe. Abu Dhabi is also expected to install the machines.
It was also reported yesterday that the Bahrain-based airline Gulf Air has a task force to monitor the spread of swine flu.“We have established a task force to monitor the situation,”
a Gulf Air spokesman told the website HotelierMiddleEast.com. “Customer safety is paramount and we are in touch with the relevant authorities and will take all the necessary measures in the event that they are required.”
_____________________________________________
My reactions
1. As far as I can see, this species of flu skip from one form into new different form where the earlier skip was entirely terrible (Sars virus, etc.) This has creates two things very likely: first, as it's the flu, it's possibly greatly transferable which it has now been shown to be transfer around the world. Second, because it has skipped species, it is doubtful that peoples have grown fighting to it. We may have some bigger resistance left from the previous skip, which would be good, but it wouldn't acquire a lot of mutation to make that rather useless--note how it's already quite infectious although any possible resistance, while presently having a fairly low fatality rate, perhaps due to possible resistance.
2. I’m afraid that the more people have contract the virus, more chances it has to contaminate others, and more opportunities it has to transmute into other species.
3. The government of each every country should inform clearly to their citizens about the virus and simple way to observe and prevent because some country found infected people, and some still no any infection report. I think the government should act reasonably, NOT too overeating because it might confuse people.
4. This news of virus could make pork sellers in trouble.
5. Also with tourism business, as almost every media focusing on swine flu spread out. Number of people travelling could decrease.
6. This swine flu not only effecting health problem for us to concern, this is more likely to have a huge effect towards the country economy.
7. It seems that the media, politicians, and health officials have the population poised for extinction. This year the health disaster is the Swine Flu.
8. I think media has overreaction toward swine flu by spreading news causing many people kill innocent pig!
9. I’d suggest to continue the gentle reminder “to wash your hands and to cough in your elbow” and cut out the hysteria.
*********************************************************
My conclusion
Regarding the Swine Flu scare, poor pigs, and country’s economic. We are not supposed to refer to it as the Swine Flu, but by H1N1, as it really isn’t Swine Flu. The origins of this new strain are unknown, and the World Organization for Animal Health reports that this strain has not been isolated in swine.
People are getting too much “hype’ over this outbreak and people throughout Thailand and the globe are getting scared. I think people need to be informed correctly not exaggerated by media or government. The information needs to be more balanced.
Swine flu is now effecting each part of the world in economic slow down. In Thailand, the government recently complete with defending process on Swine Flu. So the media should help inform information to decreased worriless of travelers, investors, customers and pig sellers (not to kill any more pigs).
Asia's first swine-flu case confirmed in Hong Kong - Update
Posted : Fri, 01 May 2009 14:05:42 GMT
Hong Kong - Asia's first case of swine flu has been confirmed in Hong Kong, the territory's leader, Donald Tsang, announced Friday. The patient is a visitor from Mexico, the worst-hit country in the swine-flu outbreak, who travelled to Hong Kong from Shanghai Thursday and was staying at a hotel in the city's Wan Chai district.
The patient has been taken to the city's Ruttonjee Hospital and was in stable condition Friday evening, Chief Executive Tsang said at a press briefing Friday night.
The hotel where the patient was staying, the Metropark, has been quarantined with all guests barred from leaving, reporters were told.
Guests staying at the hotel told the government-run radio station RTHK that no one was being allowed to leave or enter the hotel.
Tsang announced the case after a meeting of top government officials was convened Friday afternoon in response to news of the confirmed case.
The Hong Kong leader appealed to the public not to panic and said everything would be done to prevent the virus from spreading in the city of 7 million.
Hong Kong has raised its swine-flu alert level from "serious" to "emergency" in response to the confirmation of the case. Details of the heightened measures were due to be announced later.
Schools were to remain open and public gatherings and exhibitions were to continue as normal but under more stringent hygiene measures, Tsang said in advance of the details being released.
News of the case came after Tsang warned earlier this week that Hong Kong was at a greater risk of a swine-flu outbreak because it is one of the world's most densely populated cities.
Before Hong Kong's announcement of its case, the World Health Organization said Friday that 331 human cases of swine flu have been reported in 11 countries. Ten cases have been fatal - nine in Mexico and one in the United States.
Ironically, the first case of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, in Hong Kong in 2003 was traced back to a patient from China staying in another hotel in the city.
A total of 299 people died and about 1,800 were infected with the SARS virus in the city of 7 million, and the virus spread from Hong Kong around the world.
_____________________________________________
Article 2
Asia Seeks to Stem Contagion as Swine Flu Spreads (Update3)
By Heejin Koo and Hanny Wan
May 2 (Bloomberg) -- South Korea confirmed its first case of swine flu one day after a patient in Hong Kong was diagnosed with the disease, as Asian health officials battle to contain a virus that has spread to 15 nations on three continents.
“After a period of cell cultivation, we have deemed that the patient has contracted the virus,” Lee Jong Koo, director of the Korea Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, told reporters today in Seoul.
South Korea this week raised its alert status, issued a travel warning on Mexico, tightened checks on inbound travelers and boosted inspections of pork products. Hong Kong declared a public emergency after confirming its first case yesterday, one day after the World Health Organization said it may soon declare the world’s first influenza pandemic since 1968.
Hong Kong’s first swine flu patient is a man who arrived from Mexico on April 30, Chief Executive Donald Tsang said yesterday, urging the public not to panic. The government said today it moved 12 guests of the Metro Park Hotel, where the man stayed, to a holiday village prepared as a quarantine center.
Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control told 24 people who traveled on the same Shanghai-to-Hong Kong flight and later returned to Taiwan to quarantine themselves until May 7, according to a statement last night. It also raised the travel alert for Hong Kong to yellow, the lowest of a three-scale rating.
Hundreds more cases of swine flu are suspected in New York, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand.
The virus, known formally as influenza A (H1N1), is confirmed to have infected more than 350 people with 10 deaths, according to the WHO’s Website. The symptoms of the disease may be no more severe than seasonal flu ailments, world health officials said.
South Korean Nun
A 51-year-old South Korean nun, who returned to Korea on April 26 from a week of aid activities in Mexico, is being treated at a military hospital in Gyeonggi province, outside the capital city of Seoul.
“Her fever, coughing and other symptoms have cleared,” said Choi Kang Won, the doctor in charge of her care. “She’s been treated with Tamiflu, and we’ll discuss the possibility of releasing her after this weekend.”
The patient may be released from the hospital as early as tomorrow, Yonhap News reported, without saying where it obtained the information. KCDC officials declined to confirm the report.
Another South Korean “probable” swine flu patient is a 44-year-old nun who may have been infected by her colleague in the nation’s first case of secondary contagion, Lee said.
Masks & Soap
South Korea’s customs officers at Incheon International Airport and other airports and shipping ports have tightened the screening process for travelers and disinfection procedures on carriers and ships, Prime Minister Han Seung Soo’s office said in an e-mailed statement today.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry announced late yesterday it will provide $500,000 worth of emergency medical aid to Mexico, including masks, thermometers and disinfectant liquid soap.
The 25-year-old Mexican patient in Hong Kong is in Ruttonjee Hospital in the city’s Wan Chai district, Tsang said.
A man wearing a surgical mask was seen carrying boxes labeled “Tamiflu” into the lobby of the Metro Park Hotel. Hong Kong has 20 million doses of Tamiflu, made by Roche Holding AG, and other anti-flu medicines in stock, the South China Morning Post reported April 27.
Hong Kong pledged to step up measures to contain swine flu after guests at a second local hotel were suspected of having the virus.
Hotel Guests
Some guests in L’hotel Nina et Convention Centre in Tsuen Wan are being examined after showing signs of fever, Lam Ping- yan, the city’s director of health, told legislators at a meeting today broadcast on Cable TV, without providing details.
Six or seven hotel guests were examined because they were on the same flight as the Mexican man, said Kelvin Shum, assistant front office manager at L’hotel Nina. They have no symptoms and the hotel remains open, he added.
The city’s international airport and all border check points will pay special attention to all Mexican-passport holders and give them health inspections, York Chow, the city’s health secretary, told legislators in Hong Kong today. The government will make announcements by tomorrow on whether schools will be closed from Monday, he said.
Asia is better prepared to respond to an outbreak of the swine flu virus, after its experiences with severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, and avian flu, Asian Development Bank Managing Director Rajat Nag said. SARS killed 299 people in Hong Kong in 2003.
“It’s an evolving situation but systems are in place to deal with it,” Nag said. “We have to watch very carefully but not overreact.”
Suspended Flights
China has suspended direct flights from Mexico to Shanghai on concern travelers may transmit swine flu, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today in a statement posted on its Web site. Resumption of flights will depend on how well the danger of a viral pandemic is controlled, it said.
The Chinese government may send a chartered flight to bring home Chinese who were scheduled to fly to Shanghai from Mexico City on May 3, the ministry said.
Health authorities in China’s southern Guangdong province are seeking to contact 11 people who were on the same flight as the Mexican patient in Hong Kong and have not yet been identified, according to a notice today from the provincial health bureau.
Test Results
In Japan, a Tokyo laboratory is testing to determine if an infant at a U.S. military base is infected with the swine flu virus. Specimens from the baby have been sent to labs in Japan and the U.S., and the hospital at Yokota Air Base in suburban Tokyo is awaiting results.
New Zealand, which has reported four confirmed cases of swine flu, cut the number of suspected cases to 101 from 116, the Ministry of Health said in a statement. There are 269 people in isolation being treated with Tamiflu, down from 388 on Friday.
______________________________________________
Article 3
Some travellers cancelling plans over swine flu fears
Tom Spender
Last Updated: May 02. 2009 12:16AM UAE / May 1. 2009 8:16PM GMT
ABU DHABI // Some people are cancelling overseas trips for fear of contacting swine flu, a travel industry insider said yesterday.
“We have seen eight cancellations so far and expect between 30 and 50 more per month, depending on how the pandemic develops,” said Hermant Gupta, the travel insurance manager for the Gulf region for the insurance company AXA.
The travellers had planned trips to Mexico, where swine flu was first detected, Canada, which yesterday had 35 confirmed cases, and Thailand, which has not yet reported any cases, he said.
However, most people are still continuing with their planned international trips, Mr Gupta said, noting that there had been no discernible drop in the number of travel insurance policies being taken out.
“It’s really too early to say how this will pan out. We’ll see what happens over the next month.”
Although Asia only reported its first case of swine flu yesterday, with a Mexican national in Hong Kong admitted to hospital there, Mr Gupta said East Asian countries were also a concern for travellers. Swine flu has now reached 12 countries on three continents but is killing fewer people than past such outbreaks, health officials said yesterday.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Thursday raised the pandemic alert level to phase five, indicating that the world’s first influenza pandemic since 1968 may soon be declared.
The UN agency has urged countries to make final preparations against the disease, but has not yet recommended restrictions on regular travel because it would not slow the spread of the flu, or the closure of borders. It is advising people who are ill to delay international travel.
A delegation from the UAE, including the Minister of Health, Humaid al Qattami, will take part in an emergency meeting of health ministers of member states of the GCC today in Doha to discuss a unified strategy of dealing with the influenza strain, which is also known as H1N1.
Meanwhile, as of yesterday, the nation’s busiest airport, Dubai International Airport, had yet to install thermal-imaging machines, which can help identify cases of the flu by detecting whether people walking past them have a high fever, an airport spokesman said.
The machines have been hastily set up in airports across the globe. Abu Dhabi is also expected to install the machines.
It was also reported yesterday that the Bahrain-based airline Gulf Air has a task force to monitor the spread of swine flu.“We have established a task force to monitor the situation,”
a Gulf Air spokesman told the website HotelierMiddleEast.com. “Customer safety is paramount and we are in touch with the relevant authorities and will take all the necessary measures in the event that they are required.”
_____________________________________________
My reactions
1. As far as I can see, this species of flu skip from one form into new different form where the earlier skip was entirely terrible (Sars virus, etc.) This has creates two things very likely: first, as it's the flu, it's possibly greatly transferable which it has now been shown to be transfer around the world. Second, because it has skipped species, it is doubtful that peoples have grown fighting to it. We may have some bigger resistance left from the previous skip, which would be good, but it wouldn't acquire a lot of mutation to make that rather useless--note how it's already quite infectious although any possible resistance, while presently having a fairly low fatality rate, perhaps due to possible resistance.
2. I’m afraid that the more people have contract the virus, more chances it has to contaminate others, and more opportunities it has to transmute into other species.
3. The government of each every country should inform clearly to their citizens about the virus and simple way to observe and prevent because some country found infected people, and some still no any infection report. I think the government should act reasonably, NOT too overeating because it might confuse people.
4. This news of virus could make pork sellers in trouble.
5. Also with tourism business, as almost every media focusing on swine flu spread out. Number of people travelling could decrease.
6. This swine flu not only effecting health problem for us to concern, this is more likely to have a huge effect towards the country economy.
7. It seems that the media, politicians, and health officials have the population poised for extinction. This year the health disaster is the Swine Flu.
8. I think media has overreaction toward swine flu by spreading news causing many people kill innocent pig!
9. I’d suggest to continue the gentle reminder “to wash your hands and to cough in your elbow” and cut out the hysteria.
*********************************************************
My conclusion
Regarding the Swine Flu scare, poor pigs, and country’s economic. We are not supposed to refer to it as the Swine Flu, but by H1N1, as it really isn’t Swine Flu. The origins of this new strain are unknown, and the World Organization for Animal Health reports that this strain has not been isolated in swine.
People are getting too much “hype’ over this outbreak and people throughout Thailand and the globe are getting scared. I think people need to be informed correctly not exaggerated by media or government. The information needs to be more balanced.
Swine flu is now effecting each part of the world in economic slow down. In Thailand, the government recently complete with defending process on Swine Flu. So the media should help inform information to decreased worriless of travelers, investors, customers and pig sellers (not to kill any more pigs).
