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In the wake of the country’s first death linked to a positive swine flu diagnosis, the Ministry of Health said on Sunday that the government would increase measures to control the spread of the H1N1 virus.

The ministry’s director general of communicable diseases, Tjandra Yoga Aditama, said the government had already been on maximum alert for the disease and would focus on preventing the virus from spreading further.

This would include better monitoring at airports and seaports to help isolate the outbreak, while distributing antiviral drugs to about 100 major hospitals across the country appointed to care for people infected with the virus.

Last Wednesday, a 6-year-old girl in a Jakarta hospital became the first Indonesian to die from the disease. She had experienced several health problems prior to her infection with the H1N1 virus and had endured severe pneumonia for years.

The girl was hospitalized for three days with fever and breathing problems.

“The child had already experienced health problems for several years and delayed development … this patient had severe pneumonia and the result of a polymerase chain reaction has shown that she was positively [infected] by influenza A,” Tjandra said referring to the H1N1 virus.

However, he said there was no reason for people to panic. “More than 95 percent of the people infected with influenza A are cured, some without even receiving any treatment,” he said.

The World Health Organization says swine flu has spread to nearly all countries in the world, with about 800 fatalities.

The Southeast Asian region has seen 44 deaths in Thailand and 4 in Singapore.

Indonesia so far has recorded 343 swine flu sufferers after its first cases emerged in June when a British tourist and an Indonesian pilot tested positive.

Dr. Handrawan Nadesul, a health observer and columnist, said that handling the disease required cooperation from a multitude of government institutions. “There needs to be more information provided to people, especially those in rural and remote areas,” he said.

“The immigration office must prevent any more people with the virus from entering or moving to other parts of the country.”

Officials have installed thermal scanners in several major international airports and seaports. Incoming travelers from infected countries also have to fill in health alert cards for tracking purposes upon arrival.

Although not as deadly as bird flu, swine flu has a faster rate of infection. Unlike the avian influenza H5N1 virus, H1N1 can spread from human to human.

However, scientists fear the two viruses merging and mutating into a single super virus, with the deadly traits of H5N1 and the infection rate of H1N1.

The WHO has declared the outbreak a pandemic, its top alert level.