WHO Set to Announce Pandemic over Australia Swine Flu Boom

(Novinite) -- The World Health Organization has said that a sharp increase in swine flu cases in Australia may push it to finally announce a flu pandemic.

It would be the first such pandemic announced in four decades. More than 1 200 people have contracted the virus in Australia, a four-fold increase in a week, the BBC reported.

Less than a month ago Australia had only a handful of cases of the H1N1 virus but it now has the highest number of infections outside North America.

Victoria and the state capital, Melbourne, are the worst-hit with more than 1 000 confirmed cases, although most of those affected are suffering only a mild illness.

The entire squad and staff of the Brisbane Broncos rugby league club have been put into quarantine as tests are carried out on a player suspected of contracting swine flu.

There have been no swine flu fatalities in Australia.

The rapid spread of swine flu in Australia could force the World Health Organisation to declare a pandemic, meaning the outbreak had gone global.

For that to happen, officials would have to verify that the disease had become established outside North America, where the crisis began.