It seems that health care workers do not only visit educational establishments. Upon seeing the cashier officers at the MTS office (mobile phone operator «Mobile TeleSystems») wearing medical masks, the sanitary epidemiological inspection service strongly encouraged the company’s administration to convince their employees to remove the masks and not to spread the feeling of panic. However, the staff’s fear of contracting the disease as they meet hundreds of customers every day is stronger and they refused to remove the masks.

On 2 November the Ministry of Health instructed the sanitary epidemiological inspection service to withdraw the leaflets containing the information about the flu, which had been previously disseminated in the state-sponsored organizations. The posters, prepared in cooperation with UNICEF and posted in public places are also subject to removal. The staff of the sanitary epidemiological inspection service is prohibited to wear masks; this is primarily true for the people working at Ashgabat`s airport.

The Ministry of Health explains the ban by their intention to stop the panic among the citizens.

For the last two weeks, Ashgabat`s drugs stores have been facing a real boom. When they still had antibiotics, respirators and oxolin nasal ointment in stock, more than 50 persons queued up. As of today, most of the drugs stores have run out of this medication.

One can often see people wearing respiratory masks in town, which has never been the case in Turkmenistan, and this is a good illustration of how scared the people are. For those, who work in crowded places, the medical masks have become an integral part of every day life.

Speculators, who took advantage of the deficit of masks and antibiotics, are selling them at a price, which is many times higher than in the drug stores. For instance, medical masks are sold at 35 000 - 50 000 (while in drug stores, if there are any, they cost 5000 - 10000 manats), and oxolin nasal ointment, which costs 20 000 manats in drug stores, costs between 50 000 and 80 000. All prices are given in non-denominated manats (14250 manats = $1).

As we learn from the staff of a medical service, vaccinations have been recently been bought to combat the flu; however, the virologic labs still do not have chemical agents identifying the А/H1N1 strain.

The same person also confirmed the number of fatalities: it is known that a student of school №37, a 25 y.o. man and a 6-month pregnant woman died following flu complications. However, according to the rumours, the number of deaths is much higher.

At the moment hospitals holding infected patients are jampacked. The doctors refuse to accept new patients and advise them to seek treatment at home.

Despite the fact that half of the students are absent from classes, the schools are not closed.

The absurdity of the actions of the Health Ministry officials, when instead of raising awareness among the population and adopting prevention measures they are busy concealing the terrible epidemiologic situation, can be explained by the internal policies, conducted by the authorities: there is no room for negative things in the époque of the great renaissance. At least, these should not be mentioned.

Moreover, during the entire year, Turkmen mass media have repeatedly and enthusiastically informed about the complete readiness of all national services to combat the A/H1N1 virus.