Doctors confirmed a case of AH1N1, or swine flu in Romania, in a patient from the county of Sibiu. The 34-year old man is however feeling well, getting treatment at home, and almost cured.

Two other people were suspected of having the same virus. Two employees of the Sibiu airport, of 22 and 26 respectively, were hospitalized with breathing problems, after another colleague had died after presenting similar symptoms.

The 30-year old man who died however had severe pulmonary problems, and not swine flu. His wife said he had been sent from one hospital to the other, and believes doctors did not take his case seriously enough to provide proper treatment.

Swine flu caused a pandemic after the 2007 and 2009 outbreaks. First described in April 2009, the virus appeared to be a new strain of H1N1 which resulted when a previous triple reassortment of bird, swine and human flu viruses further combined with a Eurasian pig flu virus, leading to the term "swine flu”. The flu manifests itself as increased breathing difficulty and typically occurs 3–6 days after initial onset of flu symptoms.

Despite its name, the flu is not transmitted by eating pork products, but rather contracted by person to person transmission through respiratory droplets. In 2010, the World Health Organization announced the end of the swine flu pandemic. Cases of swine were recently confirmed in the US, where one died and eight were admitted to hospitals.

editor@romania-insider.com