U.S. federal health experts expect to find more cases of a unique new form of swine flu as they check people who had contact with seven California and Texas residents diagnosed with the illness, according to AP. All of the seven victims recovered from the flu that combines pig, bird and human viruses in a way that researchers have not seen before, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday. The cases are a growing medical mystery because it's unclear how they caught the virus. The CDC said none of the seven people were in contact with pigs, which is how people usually catch swine flu. And only a few were in contact with each other. Still, health officials said it's not a cause for public alarm: The five in California and two in Texas all recovered, only one person was hospitalized and testing indicates some mainstream antiviral medications seem to work against the virus. Dr. Anne Schuchat of the CDC said officials believe it can spread human-to-human, which is unusual for a swine flu virus. The CDC is checking people who have been in contact with the seven confirmed cases, who all became ill between late March and mid-April. Because of intensive searching, it's likely health officials will find additional cases, said Schuchat, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. CDC officials detected a virus with a unique combination of gene segments that have not been seen in people or pigs before. The bug contains human virus, avian virus from North America and pig viruses from North America, Europe and Asia.
