WHO close to raising alert to highest level for swine flu
Tuesday, June 9, 2009 - 14:07
in Health & Medicine
The H1N1 outbreak would be considered a pandemic. But the health organization is worried that could lead to border closings, travel restrictions and people with mild illnesses flooding ERs. The World Health Organization is inching closer to raising the infectious disease alert level for the novel H1N1 influenza outbreak to its highest level, indicating that a pandemic has arrived, but has delayed doing so in an effort to prepare national health organizations and populations for the impact of such an announcement, said Dr. Keiji Fukuda, assistant director general of the agency, this morning in a telephone news conference.