WHO worries about swine flu deaths with no underlying illness

[Guest guest]

WHO worries about swine flu deaths with no underlying illness

Tue Sep 22, 12:13 pm ET

HONG KONG (AFP) – The World Health Organization said Tuesday it was worried that

up to a quarter of the fatal swine flu cases in the Western Pacific were

patients with no underlying medical condition.

By September 19, an estimated 25 percent of the 352 death cases reported in the

region had no prior medical problems, the WHO announced at its Western Pacific

annual conference in Hong Kong.

" That worries us very much. We are looking into it, " Takeshi Kasai, the

organisation's regional adviser on communicable disease surveillance and

response, told the media on the sidelines of the conference.

In other regions the proportion of swine flu fatalities with no underlying

medical condition ranged from 20 to 50 percent, he said.

Kasai said one of the more plausible hypotheses virologists had come up with was

that the virus replicated more rapidly in those patients.

He said that the WHO was also concerned that young adults were dying of swine

flu, while small children and elderly people tend to be the main groups that

succumb to seasonal influenza.

The West Pacific region covers 37 countries and extends from China and Mongolia

to Australia, New Zealand and French Polynesia.

http://news./s/afp/20090922/hl_afp/healthfluasiawho_20090922161410