In a welcome respite for an anxious public, the Department of Health on Friday said no additional Influenza A(H1N1) cases have been recorded in the Philippines. The country's total confirmed cases remained at 344, of which 262 patients have been discharged after being considered to have recovered, said Health Secretary Francisco Duque III. Duque also said no A(H1N1) deaths have been reported so far and that all the confirmed cases in the country are mild. Nonetheless, he advised the public not to be too complacent. “We should continue to be vigilant as we, in the government, continue to monitor if there are any changes in its trends and patterns,” he said. Duque said 68 percent of the patients, or 234 of the 344, are from Metro Manila or the National Capital Region (NCR). Other affected regions were Central Luzon (Region 3) with 45 cases or 13 percent, and the Calabarzon or (Region IV-A) with 31 cases or nine percent. He also noted that in Metro Manila, most cases came from Quezon City with 81 cases or 34 percent; Manila with 44 or 18 percent; Para?aque with 21 or nine percent; and Makati with 15 cases or six percent. He said the age bracket of the patients ranges from one to 76. Majority of them are males and most of cases belonged the 15-24 years age group. Duque said 305 of the cases are Filipinos. “The rest are Japanese (6), American (4), Australian (1), Chinese (1), Indian (1), Iranian (1), Korean (1) and Swedish (1). The remaining 22 did not specify their nationality,” he told GMANews. He said 101 patients had history of travel to a country which had reported confirmed cases. Forty-eight of them had traveled to the United States, while 16 patients had been to Japan and 10 to China.
