Chile Reports 1st Swine-Flu Death in South America

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Chile Reports 1st Swine-Flu Death in South America

SANTIAGO – Chilean authorities confirmed Tuesday the first death from the AH1N1

flu virus in this country, which is also the first in South America.

Vera Maldonado, 37, died early Monday in the Puerto Montt hospital some

1,000 kilometers (620 miles) south of Santiago, officials at the Health Ministry

told Efe.

The authorities said that Vera's death, caused by kidney failure and cardiac

arrest, was a result of the AH1N1 virus.

Doctors told Chilean media that the patient showed symptoms related to the

illness, but delayed seeing a doctor for so long that his condition got worse.

Vera thus became the first fatality in South America from the new strain of

swine flu, which has caused 103 deaths in Mexico, 17 in the United States and

one in Costa Rica.

In Chile the number of contagions has now risen to 313, four of whom are in

serious condition.

The presence of the virus has been confirmed in 18,965 people in 64 countries,

according to the World Health Organization, which puts the global death toll

from the illness at 123. EFE