Swine flu spreads to Asia as HK reports case

Hong Kong: The first confirmed case of swine flu in Asia was recorded in Hong Kong yesterday after a Mexican man who arrived via Shanghai tested positive, Chief Executive Donald Tsang announced.

More than 300 guests and staff at the hotel where the patient had briefly stayed were placed under quarantine for seven days as officials announced “draconian” measures in a bid to contain the disease, reports AFP.

“We have our first confirmed swine flu case in Hong Kong. He is Mexican,” Tsang told reporters.

The 25-year-old Mexican arrived in Hong Kong on Thursday from Mexico via Shanghai on China Eastern Airlines flight MU 505, Tsang said.

He was admitted to hospital on Thursday night suffering from a fever and tested positive on Friday for swine flu. He was in stable condition, Tsang said.

The Metropark Hotel in Wanchai district where he had been staying had been isolated, he said.

“I will raise the alert level from serious to emergency,” the chief executive said.

Despite putting Hong Kong on its highest level of alert, Tsang said all social activities and exhibitions would go ahead as normal and schools would remain open in the city, which is still scarred by memories of the SARS epidemic in 2003.

“I stress we don’t need to panic,” he said.