MaltaMedia.com

The number of confirmed cases of A (H1N1) swine flu virus in Malta has risen to 55 in one week since the first case was detected exactly one week ago.

The new cases are all in Gozo: two in Ghajnsielem, two in Gharb, one in San Lawrenz, one in Victoria and one in Sannat. There were another 9 confirmed cases on Tuesday afternoon.

Favourite Channel News reports.

Parliamentary Secretary Mario Galea said in a press conference on Wednesday that since it was now evident that there was community transmission and in line with the guidelines of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Malta would now move from containment to mitigation. Any person showing symptoms of the swine flu virus would be given anti-virals if they were in vulnerable groups and swabbing would also take place randomly.

In fact, a room in the basement of Mater Dei Hospital has been set up for this purpose, where swabs are taken from patients suspected to be suffering from the virus. The swabs are then processed and fast tracked to the laboratory. The swabs are taken from the back of the patients’ throats after inserting a special cotton bud through the nose.

The most vulnerable people are children aged five or younger, pregnant women and people with chronic illnesses such as heart, respiratory and kidney problems. These people will be swabbed and given tamiflu.

The WHO has reported that healthy adults are not considered vulnerable and the majority of people recover without tamiflu.

Mr Galea again insisted that those feeling unwell should not leave their home whatever the reason. He added that the government had enough stock of Tamiflu for 25% of the population and that this would increase to 35% by September. There were also private stocks of Tamiflu of around 11%.

“The AH1N1 virus is not trasmitted by eating pork products but people get infected from other people. Therefore the precautions taken for other types of influenza must be taken also in this case. For more information read the World Health Organisation’s information here:

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/frequently_asked_questions/en/