27-year-old dies of swine flu in Bangalore, death toll rises to 27 in India

The death of a woman named Shilpa Hegde, 27, due to swine flu virus in Bangalore on Sunday, pushed the country's swine flu death toll to 27.

With the death of Shilpa, the number of deaths due to swine flu in Bangalore has risen to five.

On Saturday, 26-year-old Shamshad Begum had died at the Baptist Hospital late.

According to Health officials, Shilpa Hegde and Shamshad Begum fell prey to the infection at different hospitals and their test reports confirmed they had swine flu virus.

The other three H1N1 virus victims were Rupa, 26, Shivanna, 55, and Manjunath, 28.

Terming the incidents as 'unfortunate', Karnataka Chief Minister B. S. Yeddyurappa said his government was looking into what could have gone wrong in the four cases of swine flu deaths so far.

Incidently, in all these cases, the patients died before medical test results could confirm swine flu.

On August 15, during his Independence day speech, Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh said that the Central Government was coordinating with the State Governments to control the swine flu situation and stated that there is no need to panic or disrupt daily life.

Dr. Singh has said some parts of India are facing increased cases of swine flu, but there was no need to panic. (

The big vaccine race in Indian pharma

In early August, Novartis and Sanofi Aventis began the first human tests of their swine flu vaccines. In India, the race is between three Indian biotech companies.

The Pune-based Serum Institute of India seems best placed. It was already working on a vaccine for seasonal flu. Serum Institute's products are exported to over 140 countries, and the company claims that one out of every two children immunised in the world has received a Serum Institute vaccine.

The other two companies are Panacea Biotech and Bharat Biotech. Delhi-based Panacea is a WHO pre-qualified supplier of a range of vaccines and has collaborations with international institutes. Its working on vaccines for anthrax, dengue, and Japanese encephalitis.

Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech launched India's first indigenous pentavalent (five-in-one) 'Comvac-5' vaccine in March this year. What's unique about the vaccine is that it is the only Hepatitis B vaccine in the world to be manufactured without the use of cesium chloride, a heavy metal needed to precipitate proteins. As a heavy metal, cesium chloride is a known cancer causing agent and the fact that Bharat Biotech found another safer way to purify its hepatitis-B antigen makes Comvac-5 even more special.

There's a fourth company, Ahmedabad-based Cadila Pharma, which is collaborating with US-based Novavax, using Novavax's 'virus-like particles' technology. This technology cuts short manufacturing time.

The buzz is that one company has already managed to grow the cell line, and is now engaged in scaling up production, a tricky operation, given the myriad variables in biologics manufacture. Today, we have to depend on imported vaccines to vaccinate health workers from swine flu. We pay handsomely to procure this vaccine. Countries that produce the vaccine use it domestically first.

Given this, it is crucial that an Indian pharma company develops a vaccine. May the best company win. And whoever wins, Indians are winners.

Homeopathy can cure swine flu, claims practitioner

At a time the country is grappling with H1N1 virus and Tamiflu tablet is believed to be the only solution, a well-known medical practitioner on Sunday claimed that people can have a cost-effective treatment in homeopathy for swine flu.
"The people can take some of cost-effective and clinically proved homeopathic medicinesfor swine flu treatment as well as prevention," Batra's Positive Clinic's chairman and managing director, Dr Mukesh Batra, said.
Batra recommends 'Oscilococcinium 30' and 'Influenzium 200' for swine flu prevention as well as to improve the immune system among the general public towards the flu.
"The homeopathy medicine 'Gelsemium 30' has been proved effective clinically in the treatment of swine flu in France a decade back and has been reported in the British journal of Clinical Medicine," Batra said.
Similarly, treatment for swine-flu was done in Spain during 1917-18 war period with 'Bryonia 30' and proved effective, he said.
In the case of Spanish flu, homeopathy brought mortality rate from 30 per cent to one per cent, he claimed.