Chief sanitary inspector: Decline in flu and acute respiratory infection rate seen in Ukraine

There has been a decline in the influenza and acute respiratory infection rate in Ukraine, First Deputy Health Minister and Ukraine's Chief Sanitary Inspector Oleksandr Bilovol said at a sitting of the parliament on Jan. 13. He was speaking as part of a report by the Cabinet of Ministers on its fulfillment of the Verkhovna Rada's resolution on the epidemic of influenza and pandemic A/H1N1 flu and top priority measures to fight against their spread."Currently a decline in the sickness rate of flu and acute respiratory diseases has been registered in Ukraine and the epidemic threshold is exceeded only in four regions - Luhansk, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, and Poltava regions, and in the Autonomous republic of Crimea," Bilovol said.At the same time, according to him, the situation in Ukraine isn't an exceptional one, as every year about 18-20% of the population falls ill with influenza and acute respiratory diseases. Annually about eight million cases of acute respiratory diseases are registered (4, 052,277 people have fallen ill with flu since the start of the epidemic of flu and acute respiratory diseases).At the same time, Bilovol said that taking into account the economic crisis in the country, the response of the Health Ministry had been adequate.