DUSHANBE, October 30, 2009, Asia-Plus — No case of swine influenza has been detected in Tajikistan so far, however, the risk of appearance of this virus in the country is high, Navrouz Jaffarov, the head of the directorate for sanitary and epidemiological supervision within the Ministry of Health (MoH), said in an interview with Asia-Plus.
According to him, health authorities are taking all necessary preventive measures. “Special devices have for the Dushanbe airport for detecting temperatures of arriving passengers at a distance,” said Jaffarov, “Staff members at airports and railway stations are informed of symptoms of this disease and any arriving passenger having high temperature will be hospitalized for examination.” Fortunately, no such cases have been reported so far.
In the meantime, Tajik labor migrants are retuning home from Russia, where the first swine flu deaths have already been confirmed. AFP reported on October 27 that two Russian women died of swine flu, the country”s top medical official told the Interfax news agency on Tuesday, in the first deaths from the type A(/H1N1 virus confirmed by Moscow. The two women, whose ages were given as 29 and 50, died in Russia”s far eastern city of Chita, said chief sanitary doctor Gennady Onishchenko. “Both had a confirmed diagnosis of A/H1N1, both had pneumonia,” Onishchenko was quoted as saying.
Swine influenza virus (referred to as SIV) refers to influenza cases that are caused by Orthomyxoviruses endemic to pig population. SIV strains isolated to date have been classified either as Influenzavirus C or one of the virus subtypes of the genus Influenzavirus A. Swine flu infects people every year and is found typically in people who have been in contact with pigs, although there have been cases of person-to-person transmission. Symptoms include fever, disorientation, stiffness of the joints, vomiting, and loss of consciousness ending in death.
