Symbiosis student in Pune tests positive for swine flu

Pune: An 18-year-old girl student of Symbiosis College in this Maharashtra city was found positive for the H1N1 virus here on Friday afternoon following which the campus has been closed for a week, a university official said. "The patient is a student of computer science and is being treated at a government medical facility," said Faculty of Health Science, Dean Rajiv Yeravdekar. He emphasized that barring the Senapati Bapat Marg campus, all other 16 campuses of the Symbiosis group of institutions were functioning normally and there was no cause for panic. "In the meantime, we have decided to close down all the educational institutions on Senapati Bapat Marg till next Friday." With this, the total number of affected people in Maharashtra has touched 173, and the medical authorities are awaiting the test results of another 58 suspected cases by evening, said State Swine Flu Control Room head Pradeep Awate. In a positive development, Awate said of the 173 cases so far, 128 people had been discharged till Thursday evening after completing their treatment. "Now, only 45 patients, including one who is in intensive care unit (ICU), continue to be under treatment at various hospitals in Pune and Mumbai. Depending on their response to medication, they shall be discharged in due course," he said. With Maharashtra being the worst affected state and Pune reporting the most number of cases, people continued to queue up outside the 15 H1N1 preliminary screening centres opened on Thursday, said Pune Municipal Corporation's (PMC) health department head S.R. Pardeshi. "There were huge crowds yesterday, and people have also started queuing up today for precautionary tests," he said. Over the last few days, particularly after the city reported the country's first swine flu death on Aug 3, Pune has virtually become a 'masked' city with people sporting face masks at home, in public spaces and at work places. "In fact, at the Pune railway station, a majority of the people alighting wear face masks of different colours, blue, green, white, or any other that is available in the market," said Awate, who travelled here from Mumbai on Friday morning by train. In another development, the Bund Garden Police Station here has forwarded the complaint received from the parents of Reeda Shaikh, the teenager who succumbed to the disease, to the PMC health department. "We have asked them to set up a committee as per the government notification of 2005 and submit its report, inform us who the guilty persons are. We hope to get the report early next week and we shall immediately act in the matter," said police inspector S.M. Nadgouda. Reeda's distraught parents have alleged negligence on the part of the private Jehangir Hospital and Ruby Hall Clinic where their daughter was treated. Police have also received directives from the state government to initiate proceedings against the hospital and clinic. Over 600 people have been affected by the influenza A (H1N1) virus in India. IANS