11. 11. 09. - 11:00
Austria swamped by swine flu, claims expert
By Lisa Chapman
A wave of swine flu has hit Austria, a top virologist has claimed.
Franz
X. Heinz, the head of the Clinical Institute for Virology at Vienna
Medical University, said today (Tues): "We have had a big increase of
confirmed cases."
He added the new outbreak had been observable for several days.
Social
Democratic (SPÖ) Health Minister Alois Stöger said: "We have prepared
for the predicted wave of swine flu cases as well as possible."
The
Health Ministry announced today that it had increased the so-called
mitigation level from stage one to stage two within the framework of
pandemic alarm stage 6, the highest.
The change will go into
effect tomorrow, meaning all healthcare institutions will report new
cases of swine flu to a central office that will record the cases
countrywide.
The ministry said it had used a similar system to
track outbreaks of seasonal flu and it had clearly shown both when they
began and ended.
Suspect cases would in future be considered
swine flu cases and trips abroad would no longer be used as
epidemiology criteria, the ministry added.
Yesterday was the
first day of vaccinations for the general public, and many of Vienna’s
21 vaccination locations had long lines of people waiting for them in
the morning. The situation was similar in many other cities and towns.
President Heinz Fischer and his wife Margit were among those vaccinated yesterday.
Meanwhile
two classes at the Ursulinen sium and the primary school Lehen II in
Glasenbach, Salzburg, closed today for a week because more than 50 per
cent of their students had become ill.
A class at a secondary
school in Jenbach, Tyrol, has been closed until 17 November and a
primary school class in Heinfels, East Tyrol, has been closed until 16
November, provincial authorities said today.
The private Piarist
primary school "St. Thekla" in Vienna-Weiden closed for at least a week
yesterday and the Lustenau-Kirchdorf secondary school in Vorarlberg
closed for a week yesterday after more than a quarter of students and
some teachers had become ill.
An entire school in Lienz, East Tyrol, was shut down for a week when 26 students were struck down by suspected swine flu.
Another
patient with a severe case of swine flu has been hospitalised at
Salzburg provincial clinic (SALK). Hospital staff said an Upper
Austrian man, 58, had been transferred there from a Linz hospital after
contracting a lung infection and falling into septic shock. He has been
put into an artificial coma and put on a breathing machine. A
41-year-old man from Bavaria who has been in intensive care for two
weeks at SALK remains in critical condition.
The Austrian
Society for Medical Care of Children and Adolescents said today all
children should be immunised against both swine and seasonal flu. It
said 50 per cent of swine flu victims were children and adolescents.
Health-insurance
funds will cover the cost of the vaccinations except for a fee of 4.90
Euros a dose. Doctors recommend that people receive two doses of the
vaccine three weeks apart.
