New cases of flu might have been person-to-person

Korea’s health authorities announced yesterday two more “presumed” cases of the new H1N1 flu, which is caused by a mutation of pig, human and bird viruses, increasing concerns that a human-to-human transmission of the new strain of influenza has taken place in Korea.

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that a 44-year-old female and a 57-year-old male are presumed patients of the flu that has quickly spread around the globe over the past week.

Of the two, the female patient is a Catholic nun suspected of having contracted the influenza without traveling to Mexico or the United States, two of the most affected countries.

She lived with a 51-year-old woman, also a Catholic nun, who was reported on Tuesday as Korea’s first probable patient. They resided with 40 others at a convent in Gyeonggi.

Multiple sources told the JoongAng Ilbo that the 51-year-old nun has been confirmed as the new flu patient. The sources said additional tests were under way at the KCDC yesterday to verify the test results. The Korean authorities have not informed the World Health Organization of its confirmed patient, according to the sources.

The WHO had no confirmed cases in Asia as of yesterday.

As of yesterday, 59 Koreans reported to authorities for possible infection and 38 turned out to be negative. A total of 18 are still being tested, two are presumed cases and one has tested positive.

The KCDC said aside from the 44-year-old nun, others undergoing tests have had no direct contact with the 51-year-old confirmed flu patient.

The 44-year-old nun, however, developed flu symptoms after taking Tamiflu, an anti-viral drug considered effective against the new virus.

Park Seung-cheol, head of a committee of experts advising the government on the new flu, said people “shouldn’t place blind faith in Tamiflu,” which he said is being used for lack of an alternative.

After the first presumed case surfaced, 40 others in the nuns’ convent took Tamiflu. According to the Korea Food and Drug Administration, Tamiflu, as preventive medicine, must be ingested within two days of coming in contact with a suspected flu patient.

Jeon Byoung-yul, a KCDC official handling responses to contagious diseases, dismissed doubts about Tamiflu’s effectiveness, saying the patient has since improved.

“Presumed” patients are those who test positive for type-A influenza, the cause of influenza in pigs that is transmittable to humans, but negative for any of the known human variants of that virus.

The WHO’s tally of confirmed cases around the world is 257. The new flu has claimed a dozen lives in Mexico and one in the United States, and the WHO has confirmed hundreds of patients in those two countries, plus Austria, Britain, Canada, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain and Switzerland.

The WHO also announced yesterday that it would stop using the term “swine flu” and would instead start using the more technical name, “H1N1 influenza A.”

The WHO spokesman Dick Thompson said “swine flu” was making people worry about the danger posed by pigs and has led to unnecessary bans of pork imports and the slaughter of pigs in some countries.

Pork consumption is not known to transmit the flu virus, and experts say there is no evidence yet of infection in pigs or of humans being infected directly from pigs.

By Yoo Jee-ho, Ahn Hai-ri [jeeho@joongang.co.kr]