Death toll rises in Naples

Other two fatal cases of swine flu occurred in Naples, Corriere del Mezzogiorno reports. A 42 years old, overweight woman died today at Cotugno Hospital, while a 72 years old woman, with respiratory disease died yesterday at Cardarelli Hospital. So the death toll in Naples has risen to 8. Italian newspapers are reporting all the deaths caused by the H1N1 virus, and maybe this can be alarming for the general public. The Deputy Minister of Health Ferruccio Fazio keeps assuring that all the people who died were already ill, and that healthy people should not worry. Another big issue is the vaccine campaign: in the past days Professor Fazio has blamed on local authorities for the delays in the vaccine distribution, while praising the producer, Novartis, for having sent the first batch of two million doses in advance of a fortnight.

Quite surprisingly, nobody talks about antiviral drugs. Maybe this is good luck for the Ministry. According to a study, "the antivirals stockpiled in Italy are sufficient to treat only 7 million individuals, corresponding to the 12% of the population."