Syrian Health Minister Saad al- Nayef said that swine flu has killed 19 people in Syria, mainly in the central province of Hama, official SANA news agency reported.

Nineteen out of 59 suspects died of swine flu in Syria, and in Hama alone 11 people died of the fatal flu, al-Nayef said, adding the H1N1 medicine was distributed in cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO).

Since the outbreak of swine flu, the Health Ministry has been ordering H1N1 vaccination for all health workers at intensive care units and in high-risk categories, the minister said.

For her part, WHOs resident representative in Damascus, Elizabeth Hoff, said that several countries have recorded an increase in confirmed flu cases, mainly swine flu.

"What are particularly worrying about Syria are the tough conditions there that pushed many families to leave their houses and take residence in places that might not have the best health conditions," she added, according to SANA.

Meanwhile, Kanaz Sheikh, Director of the Transmissible and Chronic Diseases in Syria, said that 80 percent of the suspects in the country were aged between 15 and 50, and that 60 percent of them were women.

She unveiled that the health ministry will receive 100,000 vaccines from Russia.

Swine flu first broke out in Syria in 2009. Its return to the country comes at a time when the security situation is deteriorating. The absence of the local governance has made controlling the spread of the epidemic a challenging task

Source: ANTARA