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| English: World Health Organisation headquarters from west, Geneva. Français : Siège de l'Organisation Mondiale de la Santé, face ouest, Genève. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
GENEVA — A H1N1 pandemic is looming closer with the virus showing early signs of spreading outside the Americas, a WHO official said yesterday, as Africa reported its first case and Australia's tally soared to nearly 500.
"Globally we believe that we are at phase five but are getting closer to phase six," said Dr Keiji Fukuda, the World Health Organisation assistant director-general, referring to the agency's six-level pandemic alert system.
Phase five signals that a pandemic is imminent while the world would be in a full-fledged pandemic — marking global spread — at phase six.
"It is clear that the virus continues to spread internationally. We know there are a number of countries that appear to be in transition moving from travel-related cases to established, more established, community-type spread," he added.
A criteria for the WHO to move the alert to phase six would be established community spread in a country outside the first region in which the disease was initially reported, in this case, outside the Americas. "However, we still are waiting for really widespread community activity in these countries. So, I think it's fair to say that they are in transition and are not quite there yet, that's why we are not in phase six yet," Dr Fukuda said.
He stressed, however, that countries like Britain, Spain, Japan, Chile and Australia were showing larger numbers of H1N1 infections, "with some early spread into communities".
Other than geographical spread, member states have asked WHO to integrate an assessment of the disease's severity into its criteria for moving up the alert scale and declaring a pandemic.
Some 18,965 cases of infections, including 117 deaths, have been reported to the WHO by 64 countries around the world since the virus emerged in the United States and Mexico in April.
A case in Egypt, the first in Africa, involved a 12-year-old girl with joint US and Egyptian nationality who was quarantined by health workers at Cairo Airport on Monday after she showed symptoms of the disease. AFP
From TODAYonline.com; see the source article here.
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