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Our Bureau

Hyderabad, May 3 Andhra Pradesh continues to be on high alert due to the threat from swine flu as the second patient with suspected virus has been admitted to the Government General and Chest Hospital, Erragadda during the wee hours of Sunday.

The West-German passenger, who arrived here from West Germany, via New Delhi has been identified as suffering from fever, cough, running nose and body pains, typical symptoms of swine flu and was immediately rushed to the hospital, according to hospital authorities.

The serum, sputum and swab samples of the West German passenger have already been collected and sent to National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) for confirmation.

“The passenger is presenting symptoms typical of the swine flu. He, however, is normal and he is kept in the isolation ward,” said Dr K. Subhakar, Professor of TB and Chest Diseases, Government General and Chest Hospital.

The results of NICD tests on the samples from the patient are expected by Monday evening.

Meanwhile, the NRI from San Francisco, who was admitted to the hospital on suspected swine flu symptoms earlier, was discharged, after NICD found no trace of virus in the samples (from the patient) sent by the hospital.

To meet any eventuality, the Government, had already procured Tamiflu, a drug manufactured at the Hyderabad-based Hetero Drugs to tackle swine flu, according to Mr K. Rosaiah, Minister for Finance and Health, Govt of Andhra Pradesh.

The company, which supplied Oseltamivir (Fluvir) to meet the bird flu epidemic in 2006, has geared up its manufacturing facilities to pitch in to fight swine flu. Hetero has licensing rights from Roche to manufacture and supply Oseltamivir in India and about 100 countries.

“Hetero is capable of supplying 40 million packs of the drug in two weeks and can scale the output to 100 million in six to eight weeks to meet any contingency,” said company official.

More Stories on : Health | Andhra Pradesh

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