The swine flu could affect between 40% and 50% of the population.

This was announced Thursday by Center for Disease Prevention and Control of the European Union (ECDC, its acronym in English), who nonetheless wanted to clear that most cases are mild and only a small number of people affected, especially elderly and chronically ill, have severe symptoms.

"Most of those affected will have a mild illness. Only a few will suffer more serious symptoms and we can predict that this will be the elderly and people with chronic illnesses. Therefore the European countries have been working on plans to protect the most vulnerable, "said flu expert at the ECDC, Angus Nicoll at a conference in Stockholm disseminated through the Internet.

Nicoll said that the World Health Organization (WHO) has increased the alert level to 5 of 6 means that the flu pandemic is "inevitable." The severity will depend, according to the ECDC, the numbers affected and the severity of symptoms.
Canada the second country after Spain that records of human infections

Furthermore, Canadian health authorities have confirmed the detection of first case of swine flu contracted by contagion from person to person in the country, 24 hours after the Spanish government finds the presence of the disease in a patient whose girlfriend had Catalonia traveled to Mexico. The patient lies in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, east of Ottawa, and pass the virus from contact with a student who recently traveled to Mexico. Lucas Wide, spokesman for the Department of Health Nova Scotia, where eight of the 34 diagnoses of the disease, has asserted that all patients show mild symptoms and signs of improvement. In parallel, Canada has confirmed the first case in the province of Quebec.


The rate of infection is rising rapidly in North America. The Mexican government on Friday has risen to 300 the number of infected by the H1N1 virus, of whom 12 have died. In the previous assessment were 260 confirmed cases. The Minister of Health Jose Angel Cordova, said in a press conference that "the increase of people killed between Wednesday and Thursday is not because in the last few hours have killed more people, but to has been able to test "a large number of samples that had been taking since early April."