India’s swine flu toll rises to 20

RELIEVED: A mother and daughter leave the Government Chest Hopsital in Hyderabad on August 13, after they tested negative the A(H1N1) virus, which has so far claimed 20 lives in India.

Swine flu claimed its first victim in Bangalore on Thursday with the death of 26-year-old Roopa who was admitted at St. Philomena's Hospital on August 7.

She died due to complications arising out of Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, which she developed on August 12.

Confirming this with

The Hindu the hospital's Medical Director, Shankar Prasad, said her samples had tested positive for H1N1 on Wednesday evening. But she died even before the reports were received by the hospital, he added.

"She was admitted for pneumonia, which rapidly progressed to ARDS. Hercondition was 'stable' till August 9, after which it deteriorated," Dr. Prasad said. "We suspected H1N1 and sent her samples immediately for tests. We also began treatment with Tamiflu," he added.

PTI adds:

Earlier an eleven-month-old boy and a 75-year-old woman died in Pune. The toll in Pune, severely hit by the virus, has now gone up to 12.

The Pune boy, Rutwik Kamle, was admitted first to a private hospital and then shifted to government-run Sassoon Hospital on Wednesday evening in a serious condition, official sources said. He died early Thursday morning.

Another patient, Bharti Goyal, who was suffering from the viral infection, died in KEM Hospital here, they said.

With this, the number of flu deaths in Pune rose to 12 and across the country to 19. Besides the Pune deaths, one person each has succumbed to the virus in Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Nashik, Chennai and Thiruvananthapuram and two in Mumbai.

Ten people on Wednesday night tested positive for swine flu in Gujarat, taking the total number of those afflicted by the disease countrywide to 1,203.

Pune the worst-hit

While Pune remained the worst-hit area by the disease with 61 new cases being reported from the city, Gujarat's 10 new cases took the number of those infected to 27 in the State.

"All test results that were pending have come and according to them, 10 more people, including three women, have tested positive for swine flu," Gujarat Principal Secretary Health Ravi Saxena told PTI.

1,203 patients affected

The figures include five from Ahmedabad, four from Surat and one from Navsari, Saxena said. In Navsari, a 14-year-old boy has been infected by the virus. According to the available data, a total of 125 fresh cases have been reported, taking the total number of those afflicted to 1,203.

Besides the western region, flu cases were reported from Mumbai (24), Kolkata (3), Bangalore (10), Shillong (1), Goa (1), Delhi (8) and Hyderabad (3).

In Shillong, the 17-year-old male patient had travelled to the U.K.

In Bangalore, all of the 10 cases had contracted the virus in the country and had no foreign travel history. Goa also reported one indigenous case. All the eight patients in Delhi and three in Hyderabad had acquired the infection in India.