Confirmed case in east remains only Irish casualty

THERE are no more probable or confirmed Irish swine flu cases, the Department of Health has stated.

The first case of swine flu in the State was confirmed on Saturday night and relates to a man from the east, probably from Dublin, who had recently been in Mexico.

At a press conference yesterday, chief medical officer at the Department of Health and Children, Dr Tony Holohan, said at this point in time there were no “probable” cases. The man who contracted the H1N1 virus here was continuing to do very well.

Dr Holohan said there may be other people suspected of having the virus under investigation, but they did not maintain a tally on that because they were only dealing with probable and confirmed cases that required an active response.

Dr Holohan said while there was cause for hope in relation to the virus, given that outside of Mexico most cases had been mild, Ireland’s level of preparedness remained high.

He urged caution because there had been person-to-person spread of the flu in three European countries (Britain, Spain and Germany) to people not related to individuals who had travelled to affected areas.

Dr Holohan said there were 49 officially confirmed cases throughout the EU. He said the World Health Organisation (WHO) could raise its alert level from five to six and, while he was not predicting this, Ireland had to be prepared for such an event.

Chairman of the National Pandemic Influenza Expert Group, Prof Bill Hall, said, even though the virus appeared to be a relatively mild disease, Ireland could not afford to relax its guard, because it remained a fluid situation.

“We will not have a full appreciation of the situation until larger numbers of individuals with the infection are evaluated,” he said.

The Health Service Executive’s national director of population health, Dr Pat Doorley, said the health authority’s automated information line received 400 calls on Saturday and their limited information line where callers could speak to a HSE staff member received 28 calls on Saturday and a further four yesterday morning.

Dr Doorley said the health authority was also building up stocks of masks, gowns, gloves and other equipment as well as medicines.

Professor of biochemistry at Trinity College Dublin, Luke O’Neill, said there was a risk of the virus mutating in humans, but that this was extremely unlikely. “Odds cannot even be given on it happening because it is very random process, but the worry was still there that it might and the WHO is, therefore, obliged to give out the warnings,” he said.

“We knew this particular strain was a mild strain and the reason why there was concern was because it was a new virus.”