Health worker dies from swine flu

A children's nurse who worked at Hutt Hospital has become the first frontline health worker in NZ to die after contracting the swine flu virus. File photo / Wairarapa Times-Age

WELLINGTON - Swine flu is believed to have claimed the country's first frontline health worker.

Hutt District Health Board (DHB) confirmed yesterday that a 39-year-old woman, who died of the virus in Wellington Hospital on Monday, worked at Hutt Hospital, The Dominion Post reported.

The woman, believed to have been a nurse in a children's ward, is one of 13 confirmed to have died from the virus in New Zealand although the chief coroner is investigating another 20 suspected deaths from the virus.

The woman died from a rare complication on Monday after 11 days in intensive care.

She had suffered a miscarriage within the previous two months, but it was not known whether she had the virus at the time she miscarried.

Hutt Valley DHB chief operating officer Jill Lane said swine flu was "highly prevalent" in the Hutt Valley and the greater Wellington region, and it was impossible to know whether the health worker had contracted the virus in the hospital or somewhere in the community.

The Ministry of Health has said pregnant women may be among the first in line to be offered the swine flu vaccine after it was found they are four times more likely to be admitted to hospital than other sufferers of the virus.

Director of public health Mark Jacobs said the Health Ministry's advice for pregnant women had been updated to stress that they should seek early medical advice if they were worried about flu symptoms.

New Zealand is set to get an initial shipment of 300,000 doses of the vaccine, enough for 150,000 people.

Initially, it was only to be offered only to frontline health staff and emergency personnel but Dr Jacobs said the priority groups for early vaccination would be reviewed in response to emerging evidence.

The ministry has just aired the first of five television and radio ads as part of its pandemic influenza (H1N1) offensive.

Ministry of Health chief advisor Sandy Dawson said the ads stressed the need to limit the spread of swine flu by washing hands, covering coughs and sneezes, and staying home from work or school if unwell.

"The ministry continues to concentrate on making sure good advice about dealing with swine flu reaches the public," Dr Dawson said.

People with flu symptoms should seek advice from Healthline or a GP.

Meanwhile a Christchurch man has died from a leg infection after being sent home with Tamiflu by doctors at a swine flu centre.

Minh Que Tran, 44, died of septicaemia cellulitis in his right leg within minutes of arriving at Christchurch Hospital on July 22, The New Zealand Herald reported.

He had become ill about four days earlier, but believing it to be the flu, sought treatment at a central-city swine flu drop-in centre.

Mr Tran, who moved to New Zealand during the Vietnam war, went to the centre three times in the days leading up to his death.

He was sent home each time - even after he complained of agonising pain in his right leg on the morning of his death, his family said.

Virology results have since confirmed he did not have swine flu.

He leaves behind a widow and two daughters aged nine and 14.

Mr Tran's nephew Dan Lai said he should never have been sent home from the flu centre the day he died.

- NZPA