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Flu death toll rises to 86 in Ukraine
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-11-05 03:37
KIEV: Ukraine's deadly flu outbreak widened, 86 people have died from flu and respiratory infections, the Health Ministry said on Wednesday.

Some 478,000 people were registered with national health authorities as suffering from the flu since mid-October, of whom 17 had confirmed cases of swine flu, Lyudmila Mukharska, Ukraine's deputy chief health officer, told a news conference in Kiev.

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The nationwide death count from flu-related illnesses since mid-October stood at 86, while 24,000 people have been hospitalized, Mukharska said.

She said the authorities had confirmed that four of the dead had died of the H1N1 virus.

The epidemic is concentrated in the west of the country which has borders with four European Union states, one man who died of swine flu was a Kiev resident, the Interfax-Ukraine news agency reported.

The WHO has sent a team of nine experts to Ukraine to help the authorities with the situation.

Last Friday, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko ordered a three-week closure of Ukraine's schools and cinemas in the toughest measures adopted to combat the swine flu virus in Europe.