The World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement that more than 4,735 deaths attributable to H1N1, known as seine flu, had been reported and continued to increase in the Northern temperate zones across the world.

This is an increase of 210 fatal cases from a week ago when 4,525 deaths were recorded, the U.N. health agency said in its weekly update of the pandemic.

The statement said that most deaths occurred in the Americas region, where 3,406 fatalities have been reported.

Some 962 people have died from the infection in the Asia-Pacific region, while at least 207 fatal cases have been recorded in Europe.

Ninety deaths have been reported in the Middle East while in Africa, 70 people have succumbed to the disease.

WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said it was too soon to draw any conclusions from the death toll as experts needed to monitor a full year of the disease, which the WHO declared a pandemic in June after the strain was first detected in April.

Although the death rate might not be enormous at the moment we do have to continue to be prepared for developments as we go through the winter in the northern hemisphere, said Hartl.

Medicine