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Centre tells Maharashtra government to map swine flu patients

Against the backdrop of swine flu scare, the Union health ministry has asked the state to initiate an epidemiological mapping in Maharashtra.

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Against the backdrop of swine flu scare, the Union health ministry has asked the state to initiate an epidemiological mapping in Maharashtra.

In order to curb an outbreak of the H1N1 virus, a four-member central team recently visited Nagpur city, which has seen the maximum number of deaths due to the virus in the state this year. The team suggested that state health officials should start epidemiological mapping — a system by which they should track every infected patient and follow up their cases.

Explaining about the process, Dr Abhay Chowdhary, director, Haffkine Institute, said: "Epidemiological mapping helps you understand the pattern of the disease, people affected by it, review the intervention measures taken when there is an outbreak, pandemic or epidemic. It also helps us understand how it started, when and why it spread and what led to the control."

The central team included Dr Ashok Kumar, additional director general, public health, Government of India, a microbiologist, two experts from the medicine department.

"We had a detailed discussion with the central team. They reviewed the situation and emphasised on the need to have epidemiological mapping. I found this suggestion very important. Our health officials are on it," said Dr Deepak Sawant, state health minister. He added that all the swine flu patients will be tracked along with the people who were in immediate contact with these patients.

The corporations in the state have been asked to prepare an audit of swine flu deaths in their jurisdictions. "We have prepared a proforma and sent it to respective hospitals where swine flu deaths have been reported, so that we get detailed case reports," said Dr Mangala Gomare, epidemiology in-charge in Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation.

So far, there have been 13 swine flu deaths in the city hospitals. "In the audit, we will find out whether there were co-morbid conditions, what investigations were done, treatment given to the patients etc. and analyse the swine flu death cases accordingly. Reports will be sent to the state health ministry," added Dr Gomare.

Since January, more than 1,013 patients have been found positive of swine flu and 99 have people died across the state. Around 569 patients received treatment and got discharged from hospitals. There are still 325 patients in hospitals and 39 are on ventilator. The cities which have been affected the most are Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur.

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