‭Swine flu return causes emergency at Algeria health ministry

Algerian health ministry mobilised its counter-pandemic departments and Pasteur Institute laboratories to limit the spread of the swine flu as a first case has been reported since the virus disappeared a year ago.

• Two cases thought to be affected by the H1N1 virus are under control in the Central Hospital in Ain Naadja and Beni Messous Hospital in Algiers.
• Counter-pandemic departments at the health ministry opned Tuesday an investigation in Rouiba Hospital as two surgeons suffer from swine flu symptoms. They were taken to the Military Hospital in Ain Naadja and Beni Messous Hospital. The doctor who looked after them was contaminated and suffers from the same symptoms.
• Sources say the final results of laboratory analyses on the doctor showed that he is affected by the H1N1 virus. Preliminary reports show that the three cases need a pandemic investigation because the doctors have not left the country for the last few days.
• Specialists believe that the doctors were contaminated by a patient who had undergone a surgery in the hospital. That needs to determine the first pandemic case of the virus.
• Algeria is not ready to face this pandemic as the health ministry destroyed about 4.5 million doses of anti-viral vaccines as they were out of date.
• In 2010, Algeria reported 100 death cases of the swine flu and more than 1,000 contamination cases.