Outbreak of swine flu in Norwegian border guard detachment
38 soldiers at Sør-Varanger Garrison, the border guard detachment on the Norwegian-Russian border, are reported to be infected by the H1N1 influenza, the so-called swine flu.
This is probably the largest outbreak of swine flu in Norway, NRK reports.
The Sør-Varanger Garrison (GSV) has 600 soldiers and officers. The garrison’s doctor Esben Kvammen Rafaelsen says that as many as 50 percent of the personnel can get infected, but does not want to call the situation critical:
- This is not a crisis – the infected have fever and mild cold-like symptoms. But the infection is spreading fast and makes logistics hard for us, Rafaelsen says. The infected personnel have been isolated in one of the barracks. The soldiers at GSV come from all over Norway and the infected persons cannot be sent home by public transportation.
- Our mission is to guard the Norwegian-Russian border. We are now concentrating on keeping the personnel on duty in good health, the doctor says.
