Over 23,000 infected with swine flu: scientists

An international team has come out with this warning in the latest edition of the journal Science.

Analysing global travel patterns with detected and confirmed cases, scientists came out with a range of estimated patients, which can be as low as 6000 or as high as 32,000. 
If one takes the mean value, the estimated number of people infected with H1N1 in Mexico alone would be 23,000 people by April 30. The numbers increase if one adds up the figures available other nations.

On Tuesday WHO reported 5251 cases of influenza A (H1N1) infections from 30 countries. Mexico reported the highest with 2059 laboratory confirmed cases with 56 deaths. The US has 2600 human cases, including three deaths. Because of the warning, Science released the paper three days in advance. While the remaining part of the journal will be made public on Friday, this particular paper has been released electronically on Monday night.

“Our early analysis would suggest this is going to be an outbreak comparable to that of 20th century pandemics regarding the extent of its spread — it’s very difficult to quantify the human health impact at this stage, however,” said lead author Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London.