WHO mulls raising swine flu alert level

The National Pandemic Emergency Committee is preparing to meet on Friday, as the
World Health Organisation (WHO) has shown concern about the rapid spread of swine
flu in Australia.
The WHO has pointed to the spike of swine flu cases in Australia as a key reason why
it may finally announce the first flu pandemic in 41 years.
Australia has recorded 1,263 cases of swine flu, and WHO senior official Keiji
Fukuda noted "a great deal of activity in Victoria at the community level".
Under WHO's guidelines, one of the main criteria for a move to the phase six
(pandemic) alert would be established community spread in a country outside the
first region in which the disease was initially reported, in this case, outside the
Americas.
When asked if the situation in Australia warranted a phase change, Fukuda said the
world was "getting very, very close" to a pandemic.
WHO's director-general Margaret Chan said that on the face of it the world was
already in a pandemic.
"On the surface of it, I think we are in phase six," she said.
She will hold a conference call with governments on Wednesday before making a formal
announcement.
A spokeswoman for Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon did not wish to respond to
comments from WHO officials.
The National Pandemic Emergency Committee, chaired by the secretary of the
Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, is scheduled to meet on Friday.
Victoria is already in a modified sustain phase and is no longer testing every
person who displays symptoms of swine flu.
There are 1,011 confirmed swine flu cases in Victoria, 101 in NSW, 68 in Queensland,
29 in Western Australia, 17 each in South Australia and the ACT, 13 in Tasmania and
seven in the Northern Territory.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said Australia has been the best prepared country in the
world to deal with the threat of swine flu.
Mr Rudd said since the flu hit Australia last month, the government had acted on the
best possible advice from health experts.
"But I'd say more broadly on the question of swine flu ... of all the countries in
the world, this country has been best prepared in terms of the provision of
anti-virals," he told reporters in Melbourne.
"We currently have some 10.3 million doses available ... and because of the early
action our government has taken we've made sure we're properly provisioned."
Australian Medical Association (AMA) president Andrew Pesce said the government had
responded to swine flu appropriately.
"There have been times where (doctors) had various problems," he told reporters in
Canberra.
"But I think once they'd been brought to the government's attention, there'd been an
appropriate response."
Queensland added 11 new swine flu cases to its tally on Wednesday, and another
childcare centre closed.
The jump was mostly due to an outbreak at the Hamilton Road Early Learning Centre in
north Brisbane, with four new cases emerging in children aged between three and
eight years old, on top of the original case that closed the centre.
Centenary Child Care and Early Learning Centre, at Mount Ommaney, in Brisbane's
southwest, will close from Thursday following a confirmed case.