Flu mutation
November 20, 2009
The Norwegian Institute of Public Health said in a statement on Friday that the mutation could enable the virus to go deeper into the respiratory system than it could otherwise, resulting in more severe symptoms.
"Based on what we know so far, it doesn't seem like the mutated virus is circulating in the population, but rather that spontaneous changes have happened in the three patients," institute director Geir Stene Larsen said.
Authorities said there was no indication that the mutated virus was resistant to the flu vaccine or to antiviral medications like Tamiflu.
The World Health Organization said the mutation didn't appear to be common in Norway, although similar mutations have been reported in China and the United States in both severe and mild cases.
About 680,000 Norwegians have been infected with H1N1, commonly known as swine flu. Twenty-three have died, relatively more than in other European countries considering Norway's smaller population. Public health authorities say this might be because the country was hit early in the winter wave of the pandemic, before mass innoculations began.
According to a Friday announcement from the European Medicines Agency, five million people in the European Union have been vaccinated against the H1N1 virus so far, and that one dose was enough to provide protection for most of them.
svs/AP/AFP/Reuters
Editor: Kyle James