U.S. & World

WASHINGTON (AP) ― The number of confirmed swine flu cases in New York City has jumped to 90 -- 73 of them in New York City.The total number of cases total 286 in 36 states.

Gov. David Paterson announced the new numbers Monday as 17 suspected cases of the virus were confirmed.

There are another six probable cases in New York state, all in New York City.
Health officials believe there are likely many more cases of the flu in people who have not been tested. All of New York's cases have been mild.

Meanwhile, students returned to St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens for the first time in a week.

Swine flu sickened as many as 1,000 people associated with St. Francis, city health officials say. The school had 45 confirmed cases.

A leading U.S. health expert said Monday that while "there are encouraging signs" of a leveling off in the severity of the swine flu threat, it's still too early to declare the problem under control.

"I'm not ready to say that yet," Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said when asked about indications by Mexican health authorities that the disease has peaked there.

Besser did tell network television interviewers that "what we're seeing is an illness that looks very much like seasonal flu. But we're not seeing the type of severe disease that we were worrying about." He noted that roughly 36,000 people die each year in this country from the winter flu, so it's still a serious matter.

At least 286 cases of swine flu virus have been confirmed in 36 states so far in the United States, according to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. There has only been one death as a result of infection, and that was in Texas.

Besser said "we are by no means out of the woods."

"In previous pandemics," he said, "there have been waves and you don't know what this virus is going to do."

U.S. confirmed cases from the CDC or the states: New York, 73; Texas, 41; California, 30; Arizona, 17; South Carolina, 15; Delaware, 20; Louisiana, 14; New Jersey, seven; Massachusetts, six; Colorado, seven. To see a full list of which states are affected by how many cases, visit the CDC's Web site.

The single death from the H1N1 flu virus in Texas involved a toddler who succumbed to the disease after he was brought to this country from Mexico.

Besser said health authorities also are concerned about indications that the flu had so far struck the young more heavily than older people, and that there still may be deaths from it.

He also said he didn't think it was necessarily time to ease off on school closings and other steps that have been taken to contain the spread of the infection.

"We're seeing infections in almost every state," Besser said, "and as that occurs, those who have underlying problems (such as the elderly and people with compromised immune systems) may be affected more .... It may be that this disease is starting first in children, and then moving to the elderly, so there's still much that we do not know."

Besser said that as a parent and a pediatrician, he thinks it's best for kids to be in school, whenever possible, and that adjustments in school shutdowns might be possible "as we learn and see that this virus is not more serious than ordinary flu."

Asked whether the food supply has been compromised, he said, "It may be that pigs have more to fear from people than people have to fear from pigs."

"With each day some of the uncertainty goes away, we learn more, and we're seeing encouraging signs," Besser said.

"The encouraging signs have to do with severity." He summed up the situation by saying he was "precautiously optimistic" about trends now surfacing.

But he hastened to add that people still need to take everyday precautions, like vigorous and frequent hand washing, covering their noses and mouths when they sneeze and staying home when they're sick.

Besser said that what now ensues in the Southern Hemisphere, which is just entering flu season, will be "critically important for us to understand as we think about the decisions around vaccination."

The CDC chief was interviewed on CBS's "The Early Show" and NBC's "Today" show.

(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)