H1N1: thermal scanners at airports soon; cases 16

While India on Friday reported one more H1N1 flu case,taking the total to 16,with a six-year-old girl who had arrived in Hyderabad from the US testing positive for the H1N1 virus,Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said “adequate measures were being taken to halt the possible spread of the virus in the country”.

“There is no need to panic over the WHO’s decision to raise the virus alert. We are fully prepared to deal with the H1N1 virus,” he said. “Proper screening stations are being set up at all airports across the country to keep a check on the flu. So far,only two human-to-human cases have been reported. Half the patients who tested positive for the virus have already been treated. There is absolutely no need for people to panic as the virus is 100 per cent curable.”

On Saturday,Director General Health Services Dr R K Srivastava will hold a joint monitoring group meeting with officials from the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD),ICMR,Animal Husbandry Ministry and Environment Ministry to take stock of the situation.

The girl who tested positive had been quarantined and was being treated at the Andhra Pradesh Chest Hospital. She had come to Hyderabad along with her parents and a six-month-old brother from New York on June 9. Though her parents had tested negative,the hospital was awaiting test results of the six-month-old child,said experts at NICD.