A statement issued by its health ministry confirmed that two Ni Vanuatu children, both aged five from two separate communities in the capital, Port Vila were found with the virus.
The confirmation came from tests conducted in Melbourne after 65 samples were sent there.
“These two children were brought to the hospital with mild flu-like symptoms three weeks ago to Vila Central Hospital and throat swab samples were collected,” the government stated.
“They have now totally recovered. No serious cases of sick people have been found in their families or in nearby communities,” the government added.
Sixty-five swab samples collected randomly from patients attending Vila Central Hospital and three other health clinics in Port Vila were sent to the WHO Influenza reference laboratory in Melbourne.
These samples were collected from suspected cases showing influenza-like-illness symptoms.
“On June 22, the Ministry of Health received the results from Melbourne laboratory showing that among the 65 samples, two were tested positive for the influenza A H1N1 virus (‘swine flu’), 10 others were positive for influenza A virus or seasonal human influenza and the rest were negative,”the statement said.
Earlier this month, the World Health Organization raised the pandemic alert level for the new influenza A H1N1 to Phase 6.
This means that the virus was expected to spread to all countries worldwide.
This is the highest level of the WHO pandemic scale.
With the support of WHO and SPC, Vanuatu now has a new stockpile of 44,400 capsules of Tamiflu which would be enough to treat 2 percent of the population should a local outbreak occurs.
“But because of the mildness of the disease it is not recommended to treat systematically all suspected cases and their contacts with Tamiflu, as it was done previously in many developed countries,” the government said.
“This antiviral drug should be reserved for particular types of cases: people who have multiple diseases, elderly, very young, and those with severe disease who are more susceptible to develop complications of H1N1.”
