GENEVA: The World Health Organisation said on Sunday its laboratories had confirmed a total of 658 H1N1 flu infections in 16 countries, including 16 deaths in Mexico. The WHO's toll lags national reports about the virus but is considered more scientifically secure. The Mexican government said on Saturday that out of more than 100 suspected deaths from the strain, 19 had been confirmed. Authorities in the country, which has been most affected by the disease, had previously made an estimate of 176 suspected deaths. The WHO's most recent figures say that 397 people have been infected in Mexico, and 160 people have been infected in the United States, the two countries most affected by the virus widely known as swine flu. There has also been one U.S. death, identified by authorities there, as a Mexican infant. The WHO has also confirmed flu infections, without deaths, in the following countries: Austria (1), Canada (51), Hong Kong- China Region (1), Costa Rica (1), Denmark (1), France (2), Germany (6), Israel (3), Netherlands (1), New Zealand (4), South Korea (1), Spain (13), Switzerland (1) and Britain (15).
BAGHDAD: Nearly 500 U.S. Army combat engineers who specialize in clearing roads of explosives started shifting to southern Afghanistan."We are probably going to be the beginning of the influx you are going to see to Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Kevin Landers, commander of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 4th Engineer Battalion, said as crews packed crates and cleaned vehicles for the flight to Kandahar.Obama has ordered 17,000 more U.S. soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to bolster the 38,000 American troops already battling the resurgent Taliban."We are going to take this footprint out of Iraq," said Landers, whose battalion received word of its reassignment last month just after taking command of clearing roads in Baghdad of bombs and debris.
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