Swine flu: How the UK will cope with a pandemic
- 00:00:51
- ITN
Swine flu: How the UK will cope with a pandemic
The UK is on alert as the European Union's health chief warns non-essential travel to swine flu-hit parts of Mexico and the US be postponed. Two people in Lanarkshire are undergoing tests after returning from Mexico with flu-like symptoms and a Canadian woman is being treated for a suspected case in Sale, Greater Manchester. A spokeswoman for NHS North West said: "The person concerned has been taken to hospital for further tests, in keeping with recommendations, and purely as a precaution." EU health commissioner Andorra Vassiliou has said Governments need to reassess their travel advice. His comments came as officials in Spain confirmed Europe's first case of swine flu. The man, who had recently been in Mexico is said to be responding well to treatment and was not in a serious condition. The disease has claimed 103 lives in Mexico with as many as 1,600 carrying the virus. Cases have been confirmed in countries including the US, Spain, New Zealand, Canada. Passengers returning to Heathrow from Mexico City are being kept aboard their planes while health officials ask them if they feel unwell and assess anyone's symptoms and travel history. However, some passengers arriving at Gatwick on a Thomas Cook flight from Cancun, Mexico, said they had walked straight through to arrivals with no problems. Sid Cashmore, 50, a self-employed businessman from West Bromwich, said: "We were staying two hours from Cancun. You wouldn't have known anything was wrong but for the television. There was no mention of it at the resort. We were some distance from the outbreak, if we'd been closer I would have been more concerned. We thought there might be some screening, but there's been absolutely nothing." A Department of Health spokeswoman said the outbreak was "unusual and of concern". She said surveillance arrangements in the UK were being "stepped up" but added: "It is too early to make a complete assessment of the health implications of this new virus or if it could represent the appearance of a potential pandemic strain of influenza virus." The Government said it has enough medicine to treat half the population. The NHS has a stockpile of more than £500 million worth of the Tamiflu anti-viral drug which has proved effective on patients in Mexico, and scientists are working on developing a vaccine against the new strain. Under the civil contingencies committee system - known as Cobra - cross-departmental representatives met to plan how to deal with any outbreak. As the World Bank provided Mexico with more than £136 million in loans to help it deal with the outbreak, the World Health Organisation warned countries around the world to look out for unusual flu cases as the virus spread from the central American country. WHO director-general Margaret Chan said the outbreak, caused when the H1N1 strain associated with pigs crossed over to the human population, constituted a "public health emergency of international concern". Nations will be expected to step up reporting and surveillance of the contagious respiratory disease, which she said had "pandemic potential".
ITN | April 27, 2009
