WHO Says H1N1 Flu Pandemic May Be Declining in Some Countries

H1N1 swine flu has not peaked yet but seems to be waning in Canada and the United States, signaling that the end of the pandemic may be on the horizon, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday.

A third wave of infections may still be ahead, Keiji Fukuda, the WHO's top flu expert, said. But he added there was no sign of widespread resistance to Tamiflu, the main drug used to treat the H1N1 flu strain.

The outbreak of pandemic H1N1 influenza appears to be waning in the United States and Canada and may be nearing a peak in the rest of the world, but it is impossible to predict what will happen with influenza viruses, the World Health Organization said today. "It's too early to say whether activity is peaking in the northern hemisphere and at this point it is also not possible to predict what we are going to be seeing in the springtime," Dr. Keiji Fukuda, special advisor on pandemic influenza to the WHO's director-general, said at a telephone news conference in Geneva. "We continue to see that most activity is in the Northern Hemisphere with lower levels in the Southern Hemisphere... What you see in one country is not necessarily what you are seeing in another country."