Eight patients died of swine flu in Madurai last month

Madurai: As many as eight people, mostly elderly or middle-aged, died due to influenza A (H1N1) commonly called swine flu, in the last one month in Madurai alone.

Revealing this detail to this newspaper, a senior government doctor, on condition of anonymity, said that seven out of the 32 patients treated for swine flu in the private hospitals in Madurai city in the month of February died mainly due to acute respiratory failure. The documents available with DC also validate his statement.

“The figure might even be higher if the government analyses the death of patients treated in the hospitals in neighbouring districts,” the doctor said. “One of the main reasons for the deaths is the lack of advance medical facilities to treat influenza A (H1N1) in the private hospitals here. Only one private hospital has Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) for treating H1NI patients who suffer from acute respiratory failure,” said the government doctor.

One more person infected by Influenza A (H1NI) virus died in the Government Rajaji Hospital, Madurai, after he was referred by a private hospital at a very late stage, GRH sources revealed.

Moreover, most of these hospitals don’t have a separate ward for treating these patients, the doctors claimed. Though the GRH doesn’t have the ECMO facility, the hospital has set up a separate ward (with eight beds each with ventilator facilities) for treating the infected persons. “Admitting the flu patients in general ICU ward - even equipped with ventilators - will spread the virus to other patients,” added the source.

Moreover, Tamiflu (Oseltamivir antibiotics), the antiviral medicine for treatment of the flu, were distributed only to the Government hospitals. “We don’t distribute Tamiflu to the private hospital for the simple reason that they would start giving this drug to persons suffering from normal sore throat causing H1NI virus to get resistant to Tamiflu,” the source said.

The drug is available in all taluk head quarters and primary health centres in Madurai. “As the virus transmission is air borne from person-to-person through large droplets generated in coughing and sneezing; indirect contact by touching a contaminated object or surface (fomites transmission) and close contact (including shaking hands), we have trained village health nurses to spread the awareness among the people,” said the senior government doctor.

Japan is the only country in the world that was not affected by swine flu mainly because people there were strictly following the hand washing routine in their daily life, the doctor said.

The doctors also urge the people to visit the nearest government hospital if they have symptoms like fever, chills, body aches, sore throat and non-productive cough for the treatment.