There are six World Health Organisation alert levels.
Phase 1
In nature, flu viruses circulate continuously among animals. Even though such viruses might develop into pandemic viruses, no viruses circulating among animals have been reported to cause infections in humans.
Phase 2
An animal influenza virus circulating among domesticated or wild animals is known to have caused infection in humans, and is therefore considered a potential pandemic threat.
Phase 3
There are small clusters of the swine flu virus in people, but it has not resulted in human-to-human transmission sufficient to sustain community-level outbreaks.
Phase 4
There are small clusters of people with the swine flu virus, but the spread is localised.
Phase 5
Large clusters of the swine flu virus are discovered but the spread is still localised.
Phase 6
The swine flu virus is continually spread amongst people globally, there is no way to sto the outbreak spreading and WHO declares a pandemic.
We are currently at Phase 6 which is known as a pandemic. The swine flu outbreak can no longer be contained so countries are now trying to mitigate
the effects.
|
