New Delhi: Swine flu deaths have soared to 663 across the country while number of people affected by it breached the 10,000 mark as the virus spread to new places like Nagaland.
The figures show that there is no let-up in the impact of the virus as it claimed 39 more lives between February 16-17.
Health Minister J P Nadda said there was no dearth of medicines and hospitals were equipped to deal with swine flu.
The ministry said states have also not made any demand regarding drugs, diagnostic kits and other wherewithal to deal with the issue.
Central government figures show that 10025 people have suffered from H1N1 virus so far this year, a new high in recent years.
There also appears to be some anomaly in figures reported by the Centre and reports coming from states. While the central data shows only three persons contracted the virus in Jammu and Kashmir this year, a senior health official from the state said at least one person had died due to it while over 70 people have tested positive.
“There have been two deaths so far of patients who were infected with the H1N1 virus and 71 more patients have tested positive for the virus and are undergoing treatment,” Director, Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS), Showkat Zargar told reporters in Srinagar.
He said while one death was confirmed to have occurred due to the virus, another female patient had critical cardiac ailments as well and may have died of those ailments.
Nagaland reported its first confirmed case with a woman testing positive for the flue.
