Students fall victim to new outbreak as semester starts
- Source: Global Times
- [02:25 September 07 2009]
- Comments
People who have close contact with patients infected with influenza A/H1N1 virus wait for examinations at an infectious disease hospital in Tai'an, east China's Shandong Province, on Sept. 5, 2009. (Xinhua Photo)
'Severe' patient stable
In another development, the second A(H1N1) patient on the Chinese mainland, who had been diagnosed as being in a "severe condition" in Shanghai Municipal No. 1 People's Hospital, is now in a "stable condition," Huang Zhongmin, director of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, of Songjiang in Shanghai, told the Global Times.
By Friday, the Chinese mainland had reported 4,415 cases of A(H1N1) flu, of which 3,577 have recovered, while the virus has killed about 2,000 people and infected more than 180,000 worldwide after it had spread to more than 170 countries.
"Due to the comparative effectiveness of prevention and control measures adopted by the Chinese government, the speed of the spread of the flu is slower in China (than in other places)," Zeng said.
Flu vaccine to hand
Marie-Paule Kieny, who heads the UN health agency's vaccine research, said that it is now "likely that China would be the first country to vaccinate its population" against the flu, according to AFP.
The first batch of A(H1N1) flu vaccine is likely to be produced by September 15 as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) recently ordered Sinovac, a Beijing based pharmaceutical firm, to produce 3.3 million 15-microgram doses of vaccine, according to People's Daily.
According to Xinhua, the MIIT Friday ordered 7.3 million doses of vaccine from Sinovac and Hualan Biological Engineering Inc, the first firms to receive production licenses from the State Food and Drug Administration.
