About 100,000 people in England have consulted a GP in the past week because they think they have swine flu – almost double last week’s total of 55,000.
The Department of Health (DH) said that 840 people are in hospital with the virus and 63 of them have been put in intensive care.
The 435 cases in people aged 16 to 64 make up most of the total of those in hospital, followed by children aged under five years old, with 169 cases in hospital.
There are 149 people aged over 65 in hospital and 87 cases among young people aged five to 15.
The PCT seeing the highest number of GP consultations for people with flu-like symptoms is still Tower Hamlets in east London, the DH said.
It is seeing 792 consultations per 100,000 people and is followed in the list by another London trust – Islington, which has seen 488 consultations per 100,000 people.
The latest data show other badly affected areas of England include Greenwich in south east London, Leicester, and Telford and Wrekin.
It comes as the government’s National Flu Pandemic Service was launched with the capacity to answer more than a million calls a week.
Copyright © Press Association 2009
