H1N1 flu has now reached Cuba, Finland, and Thailand, with nearly 6,000 people infected in 33 countries, the World Health Organisation said on Wednesday.
In its latest tally, which lags national reports but is considered more reliable, the World Health Organisation said the number of infections has also risen in several countries including Spain, Britain, Panama, Guatemala, and Colombia.
The recently discovered virus has killed at least 56 people in Mexico, three people in the United States, and one each in Canada and Costa Rica.
The World Health Organisation’s Director-General, Margaret Chan, has raised the flu alert level to 5 out of 6 as a result of its spread beyond the disease epicentre Mexico, signalling that a pandemic is imminent.
She is looking for evidence the hybrid strain is spreading in sustained way in communities outside of the Americas before raising that alert to 6 and declaring a pandemic is under way.
According to the latest World Health Organisation count, Spain has 98 confirmed cases and Britain has 68.
While most of those infections have been deemed “imported” cases as a result of people travelling to Mexico, or being in close contact with those who had, World Health Organisation experts are watching both countries closely for signs the virus has taken hold in Europe.
North America continues to have the largest number of confirmed H1N1 infections worldwide.
Mexico has 2,059 cases confirmed in World Health Organisation labs, the United States has 3,009, Canada has 358, and Costa Rica has eight.
Other countries have the following number of World Health Organisation-confirmed flu cases without deaths: Argentina (1), Australia (1), Austria (1), Brazil (8), Britain (68), China (3, comprising 1 in Hong and 2 in mainland China), Colombia (6), Cuba (1), Denmark (1), El Salvador (4), Finland (2), France (13), Germany (12), Guatemala (3), Ireland (1), Israel (7), Italy (9), Japan (4), Netherlands (3), New Zealand (7), Norway (2), Panama (29), Poland (1), Portugal (1), South Korea (3), Spain (98), Sweden (2), Switzerland (1) and Thailand (2).