GUWAHATI: Six cases of H1N1, commonly called swine flu, have been detected in Assam. And one of the six detected has died of the vector-borne disease. While a case each has been detected in Goalpara and Dibrugarh, four cases have been detected in Kamrup (M) where the virus has claimed one.
According to NVBDCP (National Vector Born Disease Control Programme), Assam sources, there is nothing to worry about normal influenza and the risk factor is only with H1N1 pandemic (2009) virus. It says that the two age groups in the risk zones because of their poor immunity are infants and oldies. “However, there’s nothing to worry about as we’re well equipped,” a source in the NVBDCP said.
Of travelling people carrying the virus, sources in the NVBDCP say that such a possibility stands true only when a person is found to have been infected of the virus within seven days of travelling. The incubation period of the virus, according to the NVBDCP, is seven days. The travel history of patients is tracked so as to ascertain the place of occurrence of the virus.
This virus gets infected when a person inhales the exhaled air of an infected person. NVBDCP sources further say that samples of patients are collected through VTM (viral transport media), a liquid media. They say that VTM is even supplied to private hospitals. H1N1 test is done only at the paneled laboratories at GMCH (Gauhati Medical College and Hospital) and RMRC (Regional Medical Research College) in Dibrugarh.
No H1N1 case was detected in the State in 2018 even as 198 cases, including five deaths, had been reported in the State in 2017.
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