First case of swine flu in India confirmed

New Delhi: Its official now, India on Saturday confirmed first case of deadly H1N1 virus. A 23 year old passenger who arrived at Hyderabad from US has been confirmed to be carrying the virus.
While, the IT student whose samples confirmed positive for H1N1 virus has been put on Tami flu, his co-passengers who departed New York on May 11(Emirates Airline EK-202), transiting Dubai (Emirates airline EK-524) are being tracked.
“We have informed Dubai and New York health authorities through the World Health Organisation (WHO) about the case and informed them to track all those he might have passed on the infection to,” Naresh Dayal, health secretary told the Indian Express, confirming the case.
According to the health ministry officials, all the passengers who traveled in the connecting flight from Dubai to Hyderabad have also been identified and they are being contacted through Integrated Disease Surveillance Project “their health status would be monitored. These passengers are also being advised to remain under home quarantine for further period of seven days,” added the official in the ministry.
The passenger found to be positive for the virus was quarantined at the Hyderabad airport early morning on May 13 as he was found to be having fever. “He was then immediately shifted to the identified isolation facility and his samples were taken,” an official in the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) said.
The local contacts of the passenger have also been tracked. With India reporting first case, officials are however not alarmed, “We are rather happy that we got to know about it as it came in. The system is in place,” added Dayal.
While, the NICD got the samples on May 14 itself, but the confirmation took time. “We had to tally our results with NIV Pune and wanted to be double sure before we declare the first case,” added the NICD official.