Gert van der Hoek
In Memoriam - Editor, Senior Moderator
Tanzania records first swine flu case
Wed Jul 8, 1:32 pm ET
DAR ES SALAAM (AFP) ? Tanzanian officials said Wednesday that a 17-year-old British student who was hospitalised earlier this month has been confirmed as the east African country's first case of swine flu.
Andrew Swai, director of clinical services at the country's main referral hospital in the capital Dar es Salaam, said the teenager was among a group of 15 students and teachers who flew in from Britain via Kenya on July 2 to carry out volunteer work.
"The victim has undergone a first diagnostic test and it was positive" for A(H1N1), he told AFP. "No need for panic this is just a single case and we know how it came about."
Swai added there was no cause for alarm over the patient's condition.
The government's chief medical officer Deo Mutasiwa said Tanzania was well prepared for an epidemic, that stocks of Tamiflu were satisfactory and that doses had recently been sent out to the touristic island of Zanzibar.
Tanzania is not the first country in east Africa to have been hit by the spreading virus, with Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda reporting their first cases in recent days.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090708/wl_africa_afp/healthflutanzania_20090708174427
Wed Jul 8, 1:32 pm ET
DAR ES SALAAM (AFP) ? Tanzanian officials said Wednesday that a 17-year-old British student who was hospitalised earlier this month has been confirmed as the east African country's first case of swine flu.
Andrew Swai, director of clinical services at the country's main referral hospital in the capital Dar es Salaam, said the teenager was among a group of 15 students and teachers who flew in from Britain via Kenya on July 2 to carry out volunteer work.
"The victim has undergone a first diagnostic test and it was positive" for A(H1N1), he told AFP. "No need for panic this is just a single case and we know how it came about."
Swai added there was no cause for alarm over the patient's condition.
The government's chief medical officer Deo Mutasiwa said Tanzania was well prepared for an epidemic, that stocks of Tamiflu were satisfactory and that doses had recently been sent out to the touristic island of Zanzibar.
Tanzania is not the first country in east Africa to have been hit by the spreading virus, with Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda reporting their first cases in recent days.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090708/wl_africa_afp/healthflutanzania_20090708174427