India's swine flu dead count 2 shy of 100
POSTED August 30, 2009 - 10:24 | POSTED BY Jyoti Pal
Last edited by Harpreet Bhagrath on August 30, 2009 - 12:11
The latest fatalities include two pregnant women, one each in Pune and Ahmedabad.
Pune had reported the first swine flu death of a teenager on Aug. 3. Twenty seven days down the line, the city has had one death every day on average. 27-year-old Sunil Kumbhar succumbed to the swine flu virus on Saturday, taking the Pune toll to 27.
Kumbhar was on the ventilator and had been admitted to the Sassoon General Hospital (SGH) on Friday night with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS). He passed away on Saturday evening.
On Friday, a 28-year-old pregnant woman, Roopali Jore, had died of swine flu in Pune. She had been admitted to a private hospital on Aug. 20 and was on the ventilator at the time of her death.
Swine flu screening and treatment in Pune
As on date, 64 persons are admitted to various private and government hospitals in Pune, the epicenter of the swine flu in India. Out of these 23 are in ICU.
Pune District Collector Chandrakant Dalvi revealed that a total of 2.73 lakh people have been screened for the influenza A H1N1 in the city so far. 13,152 people with swine flu symptoms have been administered Tamiflu.
The collector also said that the city has witnessed a slight decline in the number of people coming to screening centers for getting the tests done. Official data revealed that, on average, 7,000 to 9000 people visited the various authorized centers on a daily basis. Out of these, 300-500 were given Tamiflu.
Dalvi urged the general public to avoid crowded public places, refrain from gathering in large numbers at Ganesh pandals in order to thwart the spread of the swine flu.
Pregnant woman succumbs in Ahmedabad
Another pregnant woman, 23-year-old Vaishali Kalal, died in Ahmedabad on Saturday morning. The lady had been admitted at the Rudraksh private hospital in Naroda since Friday.
Explaining the series of events, Hitendra Patel, chairman of the hospital said, “The lady got admitted on Friday following a reference from Parvati Jadhav hospital after an X-ray showed pneumonic patches on her lungs. She complained of breathlessness and later was put on ventilator after her medical condition worsened.”
Kalal’s blood sample and throat swab had been sent to the BJ Medical College lab for testing after the seven-month pregnant woman showed flu-like symptoms.
The tests confirmed that she was H1N1 positive. By the time this report came on Saturday evening, she had already succumbed to the virus.
Her death takes the count of fatalities of the virus to 8 in Ahemdabad.
