EU warns travellers to stay away from swine flu areas

With most cases outside Mexico and the US being described as relatively mild, governments around the world have tried to stress there is no cause for alarm.

However, given the highly virulent nature of the new strain known as H1N1 – EU officials say every effort must be made to contain the spread of a possible flu pandemic. EU Health Commissioner, Androulla Vassiliou, “We have to be extremely prudent in assessing the current situation in order to understand precisely the mechanism of transmission. Personally, I’d try to avoid non-essential travel to the areas which are reported to be in the centre of the cluster in order to minimise the personal risk and to reduce the potential risk to spread the infection to other people.” The new flu strain, a mixture of various swine, bird and human viruses, poses the biggest risk of a large-scale pandemic since avian flu surfaced in 1997, killing several hundred people.More about: European Union, Health

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