Swine influenza

A massive flu epidemic has spread across Turkey, with the Turkish Health Ministry announcing that one in three people is suffering from the disease in the country amid a drop in temperatures.

For the first time in six years, the flu epidemic started 20-30 days earlier than predicted.

At the moment, H3N2 - the Bolzano virus subtype - is predominant with 30% more cases of infected people than the Hong Kong virus subtype.

The Hellenic Center of Disease Control and Prevention (KEELPNO) is urging vulnerable groups of the population, and mainly the elderly, to get vaccinated against potent flu strands expected this winter.

No cases of Zika virus has yet been recorded in Turkey, the country's health minister has said, while also announcing the number of people who died from H1N1 virus leading to a form of influenza publicly dubbed as "swine flu" as 57 over the last three months. 

At least 57 people have died from H1N1, also known as "swine flu," in Turkey over the last three months, Turkey's health minister said Jan. 28.        

Three people have died from swine flu over the past three days at a hospital in Istanbul.

No longer as exceptional as it used to be, the H1N1 virus, colloquially known as the swine flu, has become a common form of seasonal influenza, a professor at Ege University's Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases faculty has claimed. 

Eight people diagnosed with swine flu have died in Turkey, Health Minister Mehmet Müezzino?lu has said, amid a rise in viral infections over the past 10 days.

"The number of patients who have died after being diagnosed with the H1N1 virus is eight," Müezzino?lu said, answering parliamentary questions on Jan. 5. 

A total of five patients with swine flu-like symptoms have died in the first week of 2016 in two Turkish provinces, as authorities have urged for calm, stressing the definitive causes of death were yet to be determined. 

Turkey's Health Ministry has urged for calm as over 11,000 people with influenza symptoms flocked to hospitals in southeastern Batman province over the last week and reports of swine flu created panic in nearby Van province.