Germany confirms first case of human-to-human flu

The first case of human-to-human transmission of swine flu was confirmed in Germany today.

The German Health Ministry said a Bavarian woman was infected after coming into contact with one of the three people previously announced to have swine flu in Germany.

Her case brings the total of confirmed cases in the country to four. The woman has apparently already made a full recovery.

In Mexico, the outbreak’s epicentre, new cases and the death rate were levelling off, the country’s top medical officer said.

Health authorities said they have confirmed 300 swine flu cases and 12 deaths due to the virus.

“The fact that we have a stabilisation in the daily numbers, even a drop, makes us optimistic,” said Mexican Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova.

“Because what we’d expect is geometric or exponential growth. And that hasn’t been the situation.”

That news came as Mexico’s chief epidemiologist launched a stinging attack on the World Health Organisation (WHO) accusing it of being slow to respond to the warning about a health crisis that turned into a global swine flu scare.

Dr Miguel Angel Lezana said his centre alerted the Pan American Health Organisation on April 16 about alarming occurrences of flu and atypical pneumonia in Mexico. But no action was taken until eight days later when the WHO said it was “very, very concerned” the outbreak could grow into a pandemic.

“It seems it should have been more immediate,” said Dr Lezana, director of the National Epidemiology Centre.

Dr Lezana said that after a rash of flu and pneumonia cases emerged in Mexico in April, his department was so alarmed that it notified by e-mail the local office of PAHO, as called for by international protocols.

“The procedure is very clearly established,” Dr Lezana said. “You have to notify the local office, then it sends the notification to the regional office. They analyse the data and decide whether to send it to the WHO in Geneva.”

Dr Lezana said the illnesses raised a red flag because the flu was occurring at least a month after the flu season normally ends in Mexico.

But four days later, PAHO still had not responded, so the National Epidemiology Centre again contacted the local PAHO office and asked for an explanation and whether more information was needed, Dr Lezana said.

PAHO responded that the alert was being handled, he said. But Dr Lezana said that as far as he knew, the PAHO regional office in Washington and WHO took no action until April 24, when WHO announced an epidemic was under way.

Dr Lezana called for an investigation of the WHO’s handling of the crisis.

There is a perception that Mexico was slow to react to the outbreak, which Dr Lezana denied.

“We didn’t wait. We notified them in time of this event,” he said, adding that while Mexico waited for WHO to assist, it tried to stem the outbreak and identify it.

Across the border, the number of confirmed swine flu cases in the US rose to 130 today as hundreds of schools nationwide closed. The only confirmed US swine flu death so far is a Mexican toddler who succumbed in Texas.

New cases were confirmed in Europe, but no deaths had been reported outside North America.

Switzerland and the Netherlands became the latest countries to report infections. Canada, New Zealand, Britain, Germany, Spain, Israel and Austria also have confirmed cases.

The Red Cross said it was readying an army of 60 million volunteers who could be deployed around the world to help slow the virus’ spread.