FIJI: Swine Flu Spreads to Vulnerable Pacific Island Nations

Shailendra Singh

SUVA, Jun 23 2009 (IPS) – Fiji has become the second Pacific island nation to confirm cases of the H1N1 flu virus following two positive tests returned over the weekend.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Pacific island countries are one of the most vulnerable areas for the new virus, popularly known as swine flu, as shown by previous pandemics.

Medical authorities in this country of 900,000 have moved quickly to assure the public that there is nothing to panic about, while strongly advising people to take the normal precautions.

On Monday, a major hospital in Fiji s western division reported an increase in the number of patients seeking treatment for flu-like symptoms. Workers at some medical clinics have taken to wearing surgical masks.

On Tuesday, Fiji s education minister, Filipe Bole, asked head teachers in schools across the country to be on the alert for signs of infection among students.

Children observed showing signs of flu with high fever are to be sent home immediately, said Bole in a press statement.
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Samoa (population 220,000) confirmed its first case a visiting Australian student earlier this month. About 30 other students and six motel staff were quarantined with suspected swine flu in the capital, Apia.

Suspected cases in the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea were also sent for testing recently.

In an interview with a local newspaper this week, the WHO representative in the South Pacific, Dr Chen Ken, pointed out that the virus was already causing community-level outbreaks in Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and the city of Los Angeles, California and the state of Hawaii in the United States, all of which had direct links with Fiji.

The case in Samoa shows that even intensive passenger screening measures such as Samoa was doing cannot keep the virus out, Dr Ken told the Fiji Sun newspaper. WHO s Fiji representative Dr Jacob Kool said at the start of the outbreak in early May that island nations have only a limited stretch of their health care systems and a limited stretch of their essential services like safe water, electricity, security and all that. We know that in the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic the most severely affected countries were actually in the Pacific and some of them had quite a high mortality. Papua New Guinea s health minister Sasa Zibe, who was developing swine flu-like symptoms after returning from a ministerial forum in Australia last week, has placed himself under quarantine.

In Fiji, the first patient was a 39-year-old man who had returned from Australia the previous week and visited a doctor after suffering flu-like symptoms. Samples sent to a national testing lab returned positive, with the health ministry going public on Saturday, Jun. 20.

Health authorities believe the first sufferer had contact with and infected the person who recorded the second positive case.

Both cases were recorded in Nadi, which is home to Fiji s major international airport and is the key tourism hub.

Fiji s permanent secretary for heath, Dr Sala Sakete, said the patients and their family members had been quarantined and put on treatment.

Earlier, Dr Saketa had urged people not to panic, but to take the necessary precautions, including seeking immediate medical attention if they developed any of the symptoms associated with the pandemic.

With both Fiji and Samoa major tourism destinations in the South Pacific, there are concerns about the impact of the virus in their key source markets, Australia and New Zealand.

Australia, with 2,436 cases, has the fifth highest number of cases in the world. Authorities in that country are investigating whether the death of a 26-year-old Aboriginal man last week was due to the H1N1 virus.

The number of swine flu cases in New Zealand hit 300 this week. According to an Australian Broadcasting Commission report Monday, 45 more New Zealanders contracted the virus in the previous 24 hours.

According to the latest WHO figures, the United States remains top of the list, with 17,855 cases and 44 deaths, followed by Mexico with 7,624 cases and 113 deaths, Canada with 4,905 cases and 12 deaths, Chile with 3,125 cases and two deaths and Australia with 2,436 cases and one suspected death.

The toll now stands at 52,160 confirmed cases worldwide, including 231 deaths, in around 100 countries and territories.