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WELLINGTON — New Zealand is still experiencing a significant level of swine flu, health authorities said Wednesday, despite the World Health Organization's declaration that the global pandemic was over.

"While some countries have seen H1N1 virus decline or crowded out by other strains, this is not the case in New Zealand," the deputy director of public health, Darren Hunt, said.

Four people are believed to have died from swine flu in New Zealand this year.

Hunt said there had been "significant outbreaks" in some areas of New Zealand, which had resulted in high levels of absenteeism from work and school and higher than normal hospital admissions.

"The pandemic influenza strain is the predominant strain circulating this winter," he said.

"We are seeing higher levels of hospitalisation in areas that weren't severely affected last year.
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Swine flu - Update 207
Thursday, 9 September 2010, 2:45 pm
Press Release: Ministry of Health
Pandemic Influenza H1N1 2009 (swine flu) - Update 207

Overall, national influenza H1N1 activity in the community has peaked and is falling. There remains some regional variation, with some areas experiencing higher than usual influenza activity.

The Ministry's twice weekly updates will now reduce to one per week - produced each Thursday.

The number of influenza related calls to Healthline has returned to the usual seasonal level, though there are more calls overall to Healthline, the majority are related to the Christchurch earthquake.

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The Ministry of Health says the death of a Hutt Valley man has brought to 18 the number of deaths from swine flu this year.

The ministry says swine flu has peaked in the community and cases are falling.

The latest death linked to the virus involves a 43-year-old with no underlying medical conditions, who died at home about 12 days ago.

The ministry says there are still nine people in intensive care with the virus

The Ministry of Health figures show although there have been 690 hospitalisations of H1N1, cases are continuing to fall

Swine flu activity is continuing to fall.

Ministry of Health figures show there have been 690 hospitalisations of H1N1, with 18 suspected deaths and 14 confirmed this year.

Hawke's Bay Hospital bosses are looking for ways to avoid putting patients in "inappropriate" overflow beds while the hospital is at peak capacity.

Patient levels have been at "red status" on and off during the winter months.

But the Hawke's Bay District Health Board said winter volumes had been handled better this year than last year.

Chief operating officer Warrick Frater said the hospital expected to operate under a red status during winter, when patient volume and bed occupancy were highest.

Mr Frater said when it was extremely busy, patients were put into overflow beds in curtained-off areas of wards.

"They aren't ideal and a project is currently being undertaken to determine if some reconfiguration of bed allocation will help prevent the use of these inappropriate bed spaces."

People with influenza-like illnesses, including swine flu, had contributed to the increasing numbers visiting the hospital throughout winter, but there had also been an increase in people presenting injuries and illnesses.

The hospital had also been accommodating Cranford Hospice inpatients since May, adding to the crowding.

Health board chief executive Kevin Snee said this year the hospital better handled the increased number of patients.

Last year surgery had been cancelled, and the emergency department was down to 60 or 70 per cent capacity, but this year no surgery had to be cancelled.

"There's been more problems this year but we've coped better."

The shortage has been exacerbated by the radiographers' industrial action over the past couple of months, as well as ongoing issues like Cranford patients.

The emergency department normally treated between 85 and 110 patients a day.

This rose to between 115 and 140 a day in August, prompting the hospital to issue a warning for people to expect delays.

Overall influenza H1N1 activity, which has been decreasing since the last week of August, has dropped below the baseline in the past week.

There have been 702 hospitalisations of laboratory-confirmed cases of pandemic influenza H1N1 so far this year, including 104 people with confirmed H1N1 admitted in intensive care. These figures do not include influenza-like illness among people admitted to hospital without a positive H1N1 laboratory test result. Fourteen of the 18 swine flu-related deaths reported so far this year were confirmed to be associated with swine flu.
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30 September 2010

Pandemic Influenza H1N1 2009 (swine flu) - Update 210
Overall influenza H1N1 activity continues to decrease below baseline levels. While some cases and clusters of influenza are likely to continue, this is much less frequent now and at a national level we are nearing the end of the second wave of pandemic influenza H1N1 in New Zealand. The Ministry's weekly updates will end next week.

There have been 724 hospitalisations of laboratory-confirmed cases of pandemic influenza H1N1 so far this year. This includes 4 hospitalisations in the past week confirmed with H1N1 (as well as updated figures for the year to date). These figures do not include influenza-like illness among people admitted to hospital without a positive H1N1 laboratory test result. Intensive Care Units have seen much less H1N1 admissions in recent weeks and are no longer routinely reporting cases in their care.

There have been a further two deaths linked to swine flu reported, bringing the total this year to 20; of these 15 have been confirmed as being due to swine flu. Details of these most recent deaths are reported on the Auckland and Counties Manukau DHB websites.

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A further H1N1-related death at Auckland City Hospital was confirmed today by Auckland District Health Board (ADHB).

This brings to seven the total number of H1N1-related patient deaths at Auckland City Hospital this year.

The most recent was a 37-year-old male who died on September 10. He had no other underlying medical conditions.

The man's death has been referred to the coroner.
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Overall influenza activity continued its steady drop below the baseline for the third consecutive week. Our influenza season is almost over, and this will be the Ministry of Health’s last update on the pandemic influenza...............................

Swine flu toll revised up to 49

Updated at 8:34pm on 15 October 2010

The Ministry of Health has revised its death total from swine flu last year from 35 to 49.

It also says the median age of patients hospitalised last year because of the virus was 26.

The ministry on Friday released a report from a group that reviewed all deaths associated with swine flu last year.

It says 1,122 people were admitted to hospitals with a primary diagnosis of the flu strain, 119 needed intensive care.

Eighty-six per cent of those who died had underlying medical conditions and risk factors. Sixty-three per cent of patients were obese.

The ages of those hospitalised ranged from 19 days to 91 years.

Three-quarters of deaths occurred in just one month - July.

Thirty-three people died in hospital and 16 unexpectedly at home, mostly with pneumonia.

So far this year there have been 20 deaths related to swine flu.


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