Swine Flu Panic Grips Afghanistan

Idris, just seven years old, is too small for the large green surgical mask covering his mouth and nose. The paper covers most of his face, and makes him feel as if he is suffocating. He and his little sister, Madina, similarly masked, are on their way to the mosque in the western city of Herat.



“My parents say if we do not wear these masks, we will die,” said Idris solemnly.



On the streets of Kabul, Herat, Mazar-e-Sharif, and other major cities, it is rare to see a pedestrian with uncovered mouth and nose. Ever since Minister of Public Health Mohammad Amin Fatemi declared a state of emergency on November 1, panic has gripped the country.



Fatemi told the country that swine flu had hit Afghanistan, and could claim as many as 70,000 lives. His ministry says that so far, 11 people have died from the disease, with a further 800 confirmed cases, the majority of them – more than 500 – in the military.



The minister ordered schools, universities, sports clubs and wedding halls closed for a three-week period. He has also signed contracts with the country’s major media to conduct a public awareness campaign.



The statistics are minor compared to countries like the United States, where the death toll has passed 1,000, with tens of thousands of people hospitalised. But in a country with very little medical information or infrastructure, the little-known disease has created turmoil.



Afghans have taken the minister’s warning to heart, and are flocking to clinics to make sure their sore throats, coughs, and runny noses are not the dreaded H1N1 virus.



Doctors, overwhelmed by the influx of patients, protest that the panic is unwarranted at this time.



“This disease is not as lethal as has been reported,” said Dr Gholam Sayid Rashed, director of the department of public health in Herat. “At most five per cent of cases result in death if untreated.”



He did caution, however, that swine flu was easily transmitted from one person to another.



“We have had six cases so far,” he said. “We sent the tests results to Kabul for confirmation.”



Four of the six patients were women, and two were young boys, he added.



The health department was coping well, Rashed said, and had assembled a team of 1,200 doctors, nurses and volunteers to conduct public awareness programmes throughout the province.



In Mazar-e-Sharif, in northern Afghanistan, the department was flooded with worried people trying to get themselves checked out.



“We got 3,000 people in just a couple of days,” said Mirwais Rabi, director of the health department. “But we haven’t seen any signs of the disease yet anywhere in the north.”



This was no consolation to Ahmad Jawad, a pharmacist in Mazar-e-Sharif, who complained that he was more vulnerable because the people coming to his shop were all sick. Speaking through a mask, he said, “I don’t work much these days. I spend most of my time at home, for preventative purposes.”



In Kabul, officials were not forthcoming with information. A reporter who asked at Ibn Sina hospital was told that health officials would not give out any details about the number of possible cases.



Dr Najibullah, head of the internal medicine ward, said that hundreds of people were coming in every day for tests. “But we have been ordered by the ministry of public health not to give out any information,” he said.



Meanwhile, mask-sellers are doing a brisk trade.



“I usually sell between five and ten masks a day, for five afghani (10 US cents),” said Bismillah, owner of the Rafhat pharmacy in Herat city. “But in the past two days I have sold 2,500, and for 10 afghani each. The wholesalers have raised the price, so I have had to, too.”



Many Afghans are sceptical about all the fuss. The announcement came at a very sensitive time for Afghanistan, politically – just one day after Abdullah Abdullah, the remaining contender in the presidential race, pulled out of a scheduled run-off.



Uncertainty had gripped the nation, and security forces were braced for demonstrations or worse, when the election commission declared President Hamed Karzai the winner by default.



Closing schools and universities, as well as discouraging people from large gatherings, is seen by some as the authorities taking steps against possible civil unrest.



“The government spread the rumour about this flu so that people would not demonstrate against Karzai’s re-election,” said Fazel Ahmad, a resident of Herat province.



Habiburrahman Ibrahimi is a freelance journalist based in Kabul. Mustafa Saber and Abdul Latif Sahak are IWPR-trained journalists in Herat and Mazar-e-Sharif respectively.