It has already been established for sure that the 19-year old boy that has returned from the USA on Saturday afternoon is infected with the swine flu virus. This is the first case of H1N1 contamination in Greece.

Dimitris Avramopoulos, the Minister of health, headed an extraordinary meeting of the National health center yesterday, after his emergency return from Geneva, where he was attending the General meeting if the World Health Organization. While still there, he announced that the case is under control, all measures have been taken and no threat for the public health exists.

The boy in question, a 19-year old student, has been in the USA since the beginning of the year and returned to Athens Saturday morning. When the first symptoms were expressed in the next morning, his parents called the Control center for infection prevention and were advised to use a vehicle of their own and take their son in “Sismanoglio” hospital.

The staff there conducted examinations and took blood samples, which were sent to the Pasteur Institute. The boy received an antivirus prescription and was told to avoid contact with other people. Later the same day he had to return to the hospital since the tests turned out positive for swine flu.

It is very important to establish the exact time the first symptoms appeared because the patient is infectious 24 hours prior to that, say the scientists. It is possible that during hat time the boy was still in the airplane. In that case, all passengers sitting in three rows in front and three rows behind him, which is approximately 30 people, will have to watch out if any symptoms appear before Saturday.

Another eight, to nine people- the parents, his little sister and a number of relatives that visited the boy in the weekend, are under observation by the Center of infectious diseases control, without any symptoms to have yet appeared.

At an extraordinary press-conference the vice-minister of health Georgios Papageorgiou announced that the case is not serious and as of yesterday is placed under treatment in the low blood pressure room in “Sismanoglio” hospital.