Thaindian News

New Delhi, Sep 13 (IANS) The Influenza A(H1N1) virus Sunday claimed 16 more lives, including five each from Gujarat and Karnataka, pushing the country’s swine flu toll to 188, health authorities said.
The H1N1 virus has thus killed 62 people in Karnataka and 17 in Gujarat. With four new deaths, the toll has jumped to 82 in Maharashtra, the worst affected state so far.

Two people succumbed to the flu in Andhra Pradesh, taking the number of deaths to nine in the state that reported India’s first swine flu case early May.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister K. Rosaiah announced the treatment of the swine flu was now under the community health insurance scheme. He said the private hospitals were directed to treat patients coming to them with swine flu symptoms and the government would reimburse the expenses to the hospitals.

The community health insurance scheme, Rajiv Arogyasri, provides healthcare facilities to poor families in corporate hospitals.

In Karnataka, two deaths were in Bangalore - a 62-year-old woman who died in a private hospital and a 44-year-old-man who expired in a government hospital.

One person each has died in Hubli, Gadag and Gulbarga.

Details of deaths from other states were not immediately available.

Meanwhile, 160 fresh cases were reported in the country, including 57 in Maharashtra and 49 in Delhi, taking the total number of people affected with swine flu to 6,139.

Other states that reported new swine flu cases were Karnataka (23), Gujarat (11), Andhra Pradesh (9), Kerala (4), Haryana and Uttar Pradesh (2 each), Rajasthan, Chandigarh and West Bengal (one each).