Southern states on high alert for swine flu

With spiralling cases of swine flu countrywide, southern states have put their health machinery on a heightened alert with Karnataka planning to screen one crore students for the virus under its free health check-up scheme and Tamil Nadu ordering passengers be checked at railway stations.

Tamil Nadu was the first state in the south to go on hyper alert, issuing an advisory to people, asking them to avoid travelling to Maharashtra, where the epidemic act has been invoked in two districts, unless necessary. The death of a girl suffering from swine flu sparked a panic in the country’s IT hub of Bangalore, where people thronged the referral hospital Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Chest Diseases, anxiously queuing up to undergo tests for the flu in the past few days. Kerala on its part has asked all government hospitals to remain alert while continuing the airport and community surveillance for detection and treatment. In Karnataka, screening for H1N1 is on at Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) and Bajpe Airport in Mangalore since May 29 and 322,000 passengers have been tested so far.

International passengers arriving at these airports were being screened round-the-clock by medical teams, director health and family welfare services Usha Vasunkar told PTI