Mother of two, 54-year-old Sheel Goyal from Model Town was first admitted to a private hospital in the first week of December with fever and chills. She was shifted to a bigger hospital with better facilities. She was diagnosed with swine flu. The pathology lab could not confirm the virus in earlier tests on her. As her condition deteriorated, family members brought her to Sir Ganga Ram Hospital on December 21. But it was too late. A day before Christmas Day, she succumbed to the deadly H1N1 virus becoming NCR’s first swine flu victim.
The local health department officials even claimed she got the virus from Congo, but that was later denied. In Delhi alone, 907 cases of swine flu have been recorded. A control room has been set up by the Union Health Ministry to monitor the situation round the clock. Since Goyal’s death, six people have died and 1,189 cases have been reported so far.
CAPITAL CRISIS: In Delhi, there are 22 designated hospitals to treat the disease. The Health Department has formed a five-member committee to review swine flu cases. It has nominated 11 District Surveillance Officers (DSOs) to check whether standard operating procedures for treatment of H1N1 cases are being followed by hospitals. Four more laboratories, private and government, are being added to the existing eight laboratories for H1N1 tests. The health ministry will also ask all states to provide low-cost testing facilities for swine flu.
SPREADING KILLER: Between January 1 and February 12 alone, 485 have died in India, according to additional health secretary Arun Kumar Panda. Over 6,000 people had tested positive for H1N1. From February 3 to February 10 alone, 206 people have died, taking the grim roll call of death to 407 this year. The most infected states are Delhi, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Telangana. Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Telangana reported most deaths. According to the latest government data, 5,157 swine flu cases have been reported from January 1 till now.