Swine flu 'spreading fast' in Australia

KATE GERAGHTY - SMH

CONTAINMENT FALTERING: Arriving at Sydney International airport from Hong Kong, one of these woman said she did not want to catch the swine flu, which is spreading throughout the country.

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Attempts to contain swine flu in Australia seem to be faltering - with the number of people infected more than doubling and measures even affecting the NSW cabinet.

Victims of the flu rose to at least 50 on Tuesday and Australia's federal Health Minister, Nicola Roxon, warned the virus was spreading fast.

With testing continuing at a frantic pace, NSW Health revealed late last night that another five cruise ship passengers had been struck down by the virus, taking the total to 14.

But it defended its decision to allow more than 2,000 of them, many ill, to go home.

Hundreds of passengers who complained on disembarking of influenza-like symptoms have either not been tracked down or have yet to have their test results confirmed.

Health officials assumed they had common seasonal influenza until laboratory results, which came in several hours after the Pacific Dawn docked in Sydney, confirmed two young boys, an adult and a crew member had human swine influenza A (H1N1).

State and territory governments are trying to contact more than 170 of the passengers who had some signs of respiratory problems or had been in contact with someone who had - with fears rising that the cruise ship infection is widespread.

Five passengers who were tested at the Gold Coast Hospital after a flight from Sydney were confirmed as having swine flu on Tuesday night.

Ms Roxon said that now there had been transmission within Australia the disease would spread quickly and efforts would shift to focus on preventing widespread infection.

The pandemic alert would not be raised from contain to sustain until the virus was so widespread that such measures as screening incoming sea and air passengers and closing individual schools were no longer effective, she said.

NSW CABINET

The entire NSW cabinet has also been caught up in the swine flu scare after the Tourism Minister, who was on a flight containing infected passengers, attended a meeting of ministers.

Tourism Minister Jodi McKay travelled on a flight from Los Angeles in which people contracted the swine flu virus.

She is then understood to have attended a meeting of cabinet before pulling out of all public engagements yesterday.

Professor Lyn Gilbert, from the Centre for Infectious Diseases and Microbiology at Westmead Hospital, said that so far the response of NSW Health had been "reasonable".

The only way to prevent influenza from entering Australia would have been closing the borders to overseas travellers, she said.

"It's a terribly difficult decision, and given that so far all the cases have been mild, you have to balance that with what it means to quarantine 2,000 people."

Limited background immunity to swine flu means it is likely that many more people will be infected than during a normal flu season, leading to more in hospital or dying this winter, a director of the Influenza Specialist Group, David Smith, said.

The NSW Health Minister, John Della Bosca, commended the efforts of Dr Chant and her team of public health officials for the "massive organisational exercise" undertaken to trace hundreds of potential victims.

Bu Tuesday night, more than 13,000 cases of swine flu had been confirmed worldwide in 46 countries, and 92 people had died from the disease.

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pou   #1   06:18 pm Jun 08 2009

hope u get better soon 4 those who get swine flu

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