WHO's announcement that it is going to include new criteria comes after a number of countries pressed it to review how it will declare a global flu epidemic, so that issues beyond the virus' spread are taken into account.
U.N. flu chief Dr. Keiji Fukuda told a news conference Friday that the new definition of what would constitute phase 6 on the agency's six-phase pandemic alert scale had yet to be established. He said danger to humans will be included.
Britain, China, Japan and other countries urged WHO this week at its annual meeting to be cautious before moving from its current phase 5, as such a move could have economic consequences
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
GENEVA (AP) - Swine flu is a "sneaky virus" that is likely to keep spreading to new parts of the world and within countries already affected, the head of the World Health Organization said Friday.
At least 42 countries have confirmed cases of the disease, which has sickened 11,168 people and caused 86 deaths, most of them in North America.
"This is a subtle, sneaky virus," WHO's Director-General Margaret Chan said at the close of the global body's annual assembly. "It does not announce its presence or arrival in a new country with a sudden explosion of patients seeking medical care or requiring hospitalization."
Countries need to increase their laboratory testing capacity to detect and follow the virus, whose march around the world was virtually unstoppable, she said.
"We expect it to continue to spread to new countries and continue to spread within countries already affected," Chan said.
Discussions about swine flu took up much of the WHO's five-day meeting in Geneva, which was shortened from two weeks to allow government ministers to spend more time overseeing pandemic preparations at home.
Chan heeded the call of many of WHO's 193 member states to reconsider the agency's criteria for raising the pandemic alert to phase 6
- its highest alert level - to avoid unnecessary panic and economic disruption.
The WHO's alert currently stands at phase 5, meaning a pandemic is "imminent."
Chan indicated she was going along with the countries which had urged caution in declaring a pandemic, saying that "even the best-laid plans need to be fluid and flexible when a new virus emerges and starts changing the rules."
With increasing numbers of cases in Japan and Europe, the world is inching closer to meeting WHO's criteria for a pandemic: ongoing spread in at least two world regions.
Chan conceded that phases 5 and 6 are "virtually identical in terms of the actions they launch." She said she would consult the WHO's emergency flu committee before declaring a global outbreak.
