Kiev - The number of deaths and infections from flu was still rising in Ukraine on Monday, as government officials argued the outbreak was showing signs of stabilizing. "Today we clearly had certain positive signs of a reduction in the flu infection rate," said Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, at a meeting with World Health Organisation officials. "We are seeing a positive trend."
But World Health Organization officials offered a more cautious assessment of the outbreak, saying a short-term drop in new infections did not necessarily signal an end to Ukraine's flu outbreak.
A total of 155 people have died from flu or flu-related symptoms since the outbreak struck the former Soviet republic in late October, with nine victims losing their lives in the last 24 hours, Tymoshenko said, in comments reported by 1+1 television.
Lab tests had confirmed the virulent A/H1N1 influenza strain, known also as swine flu, was responsible for 14 of the deaths, and another 32 persons suffering from swine flu are being treated, said Mykhailo Holubchikov, a Ukraine's Ministry of Health spokesman, at a Monday press conference.
Segodnia, Ukraine's largest daily, reported on Monday that the number of swine-flu-related deaths nationwide was actually 24.
Tymoshenko said the flu situation was nonetheless showing signs of improvement. She said the number of Ukrainians admitted to hospitals as flu patients fell for the first time on Sunday, to 42,468, compared with 127,254 on Wednesday.
Almost 1 million Ukrainians have received treatment for the flu since the October 29 initial outbreak, according to Ministry of Health statistics. Most live in Ukraine's western Lviv, Ivano- Frankivsk and Ternopil provinces, adjacent to Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania.
Officials in the Ivano-Frankivsk and Ternopil provinces echoed Tymoshenko's assertion that the infection rate was stabilizing. A Ternopil city council statement said, "there is a definitive improvement in the epidemic's situation," according to an Interfax news agency report.
But World Health Organization officials offered a more skeptical view of the numbers.
"It (the recent reported drop in flu infections in Ukraine's western regions) certainly could be evidence of better and more coordinated efforts by the government to control the flu," said Dr. David Mercer, a WHO spokesman.
"But it could also be proof the flu is moving east," he said, in a telephone interview.
Almost 50,000 people across Ukraine have been hospitalized for dangerous flu infections, and 445 are in severe or worse condition, according to a report from the Korrespondent website.
Shortages of basic medical supplies for first-line response to flu continued to be widely reported in major Ukrainian media on Monday, despite repeated promises by Tymoshenko that state-owned pharmaceutical and fabric factories would soon redress the problem.
