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World Health Organization: 40 countries have officially reported 8829 cases of influenza A (H1N1) infection

19 May 2009 08:47 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Viktoria Dementieva â€“ APA. As of 18 May 2009, 40 countries have officially reported 8829 cases of influenza A(H1N1) infection, including 74 deaths. Addressing the 62nd session of the World Health Assembly, Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization, said:
â€œWe have another great global contagion on our doorstep: the prospect of the first influenza pandemic of this century. For five long years, outbreaks of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza in poultry, and sporadic frequently fatal cases in humans, have conditioned the world to expect an influenza pandemic, and a highly lethal one. As a result of these long years of conditioning, the world is better prepared, and very scared. As we now know, a new influenza virus with great pandemic potential, the new influenza A (H1N1) strain, has emerged from another source on another side of the world. Unlike the avian virus, the new H1N1 virus spreads very easily from person to person, spreads rapidly within a country once it establishes itself, and is spreading rapidly to new countries.â€
WHO Director-General said the world was not ready to struggle against the epidemic.
â€œManufacturing capacity for antiviral drugs and influenza vaccines is finite and insufficient for a world with 6.8 billion inhabitants,â€ she said.