KRASNOYARSK -- Russia says that five citizens are confirmed to have died from H1N1, or swine flu, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.
All of the deaths have occurred in the past week. Vadim Yandin, the health minister of central Russia's Krasnoyarsk Krai, announced on October 30 that a 39-year-old woman has died of swine flu.
He added that some 450 local citizens have been hospitalized as possible swine flu patients. Three lethal cases of swine flu were reported in Russia's Baikal region earlier this week and one in Moscow. A total of some 1,300 cases of H1N1 flu have been reported in Russia.
The deaths and increased number of swine flu cases comes amid a similar rise in other parts of the former Soviet Union, including Ukraine and Central Asia.