Fast response to flu threat

Asian airports mobilise to fight the threat of swine flu outbreak in the region.

In less than three days an outbreak of swine flu in Mexico has escalated into a potential crisis for tourism worldwide, as the World Health Organisation ratchets up the alert rating from three to four, just two short of declaring it pandemic.

Level four means the virus is showing a sustained ability to pass from human to human, and is able to cause community-level outbreaks.

Today?s daily newspapers are plastered with the grim facts of the flu epidemic in Mexico, that has left 149 dead and more than 1,000 sick in hospitals throughout the country.  Outside of Mexico there have been no reports of fatalities.

Indicating how quickly the virus spreads, the UK reported its first swine flu cases yesterday. A couple returning home from a holiday in Mexico were undergoing treatment in a Scottish hospital.

The UK Foreign Office quickly issued a travel advisor warning citizens against all but essential trips to Mexico. It appears to be first travel advisory on swine flu.

There have been no cases reported in Asia, but authorities are not taking any chances, probably because of the lessons learned during the bird flu scare. Airports throughout the region have activated temperature scans for all flights from cities that have connecting or direct flights from North America.

Thailand?s gateway airports introduced scans, yesterday, for all flights and nationalities. It has three scan operating at the entrances to the immigration hall at Suvarnabhumi Airport. Scans are in place at Phuket and Chiang Mai. Passengers with a temperature of 36 degrees centigrade, or higher, will be checked by medical officers for symptoms.

According to WHO there are 40 laboratory-confirmed cases of swine flu in the US, 20 in Mexico, six in Canada, one in Spain. Tests are also being carried out on individuals, or groups, in New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Israel and South Korea who fell ill after visiting Mexico.

The World Health Organisation Assistant Director General, Dr Keiji Fukuda, said the higher alert level signalled a "significant step towards pandemic influenza", but added "we are not there yet".

He said the virus had become too widespread to make containment a feasible option, and said countries must focus on trying to put measures in place to protect the population.

A Paris-based agency, the Organisation for Animal Health, claims the virus has been wrongly named and should be identified as ?North American Influenza.?

It said the ?the virus includes in its characteristics swine, avian and human virus components.?