 |  | Flu deaths are nothing new in the United States or elsewhere. The CDC estimates that about 36,000 people died of flu-related causes each year, on average, during the 1990s in the United States. -- PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS |
The number of confirmed cases in the United States was raised to 64, but states and cities were reporting more suspected cases. In New York, the city's health commissioner said 'many hundreds' of schoolchildren were ill at a school where some students had confirmed cases.
| Developments on swine flu worldwide KEY developments on swine flu outbreaks, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, World Health Organisation, and government officials: Deaths: 152, all in Mexico, 20 confirmed as swine flu and rest suspected. Border controls won't work  FOR all the government intervention, health officials around the world suggested the flu virus strain was spreading so fast that efforts to contain it might prove ineffective.'Border controls do not work. Travel restrictions do not work,' World Health Organisation spokesman Gregory Hartl said in Geneva, recalling the Sars epidemic earlier in the decade that killed 774 people, mostly in Asia, and slowed the global economy. |
Canada reported 13 cases and urged people to avoid unnecessary travel to Mexico; Cuba banned flights to Mexico, where public life is being altered dramatically by illness.
The Los Angeles County coroner's office was investigating the recent deaths of two men for links to swine flu. So far, no deaths linked to the disease have been reported outside Mexico.
But Richard Besser, acting director of the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said in Atlanta: 'I fully expect we will see deaths from this infection.
That was echoed by US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. 'It is very likely that we will see more serious presentations of illness and some deaths as we go through this flu cycle,' she said.
Flu deaths are nothing new in the United States or elsewhere. The CDC estimates that about 36,000 people died of flu-related causes each year, on average, during the 1990s in the United States.
But the new flu strain is a combination of pig, bird and human viruses for which humans may have no natural immunity.
Ms Napolitano suggested that closing the border with Mexico wouldn't stop the spread of the illness. She pointed out that the US does a great deal of trade with Mexico and 'that would be a very, very heavy cost for - as the epidemiologists tell us - would be marginal, if any, utility in terms of actually preventing the spread of the virus.' Mr Besser said the US has 64 confirmed cases across five states, with 45 in New York, one in Ohio, two in Kansas, six in Texas and 10 in California.
New York has the largest number of swine flu cases, with a heavy concentration at a Catholic school in Queens section of New York City, where students recently went on a spring break trip to Mexico.
There also were indications that the outbreak may have spread beyond the school, with two people hospitalised and officials closing a school for autistic kids down the street. Those two hospitalisations are in addition to the five hospitalizations announced by the CDC, including three in California and two in Texas.
'It is here and it is spreading,' New York City Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden said. 'We do not know whether it will continue to spread.'
The flu is believed to have killed more than 150 people in Mexico. Mexico City, one of the world's largest cities, cracked down even further on public life, closing gyms, swimming pools and pool halls and ordering restaurants to limit service to takeout. Earlier, the city shut down schools, state-run theaters and other public places. -- AP
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