Swine flu kills 965 in India as it battles problems with diagnosis

Indian Health Minister J.P. Nadda said on Friday that the swine flu outbreak in the country had already claimed 965 lives this year, while admitting that the government did not have sufficient laboratories to detect possible infections caused by the H1N1 virus.

“We have 21 laboratories for testing swine flu. But that is not enough. We are planning to set up H1N1 testing laboratories in every state of the country,” Nadda said in the Lower House of the Indian Parliament.

The minister declared that there was no cause for panic, but urged the country’s population to be vigilant.

He also said that government hospitals and dispensaries had enough stocks of medication, distributed free of cost, to treat the disease.

H1N1 cases have been unusually high in India this year, with the states that have been the most affected by the virus being Maharashtra (west), Madhya Pradesh (center of India), Gujarat (west), Rajasthan (northwest) and Telengana (south).

In Ahmedabad, the largest city in the state of Gujarat, authorities on Tuesday banned public gatherings without prior authorization to prevent fresh cases of infection, after 50 people succumbed to the disease in the city.

The flu claimed 981 lives in India in 2009, 1,763 in 2010, 75 in 2011, 405 in 2012, 692 in 2013 and 216 in 2014, according to official data.