Fifty cases of swine flu are being dealt with in hospitals across Greater Manchester.

Manchester Royal Infirmary, Wythenshawe and Tameside hospitals all have confirmed cases. At least 17 people across the three sites are in critical or intensive care. But the hospitals say they have not been overwhelmed by demand.

There have been eight deaths in the region linked to the H1N1 bug.

A spokeswoman for Wythenshawe hospital said it appears to have ‘turned a corner’ in terms of the bug.

She said: "We are not seeing as many coming in as we did last week but we have got seven patients in critical care."

At MRI there are 30-35 people with confirmed swine flu.

But duty director Jill Heaton said the picture was not unusual.

She said: "We have had quite a lot of attendance of patients who think they have got flu, swine flu or otherwise. But we’d get a lot of people admitted with flu anyway." At Tameside hospital ten patients have swine flu, two of them admitted over Christmas weekend. In total six are in intensive care.

Other hospitals say they have had no confirmed cases.

There were none in the hospitals run by Pennine Acute – Rochdale, Oldham, North Manchester and Bury – although casualty had been busy with general admissions.

Stepping Hill hospital in Stockport had several people presenting with flu-like symptoms, said general manager James Sumner.

He said: "We have had people in and out but they are not confirmed cases. It’s difficult to say until they have been tested, but it’s been ok so far."

And at Trafford General there were no swine flu cases, but extra staff had to be drafted in to deal with pressure on casualty.

A spokeswoman said: "We had an extremely busy A&E on Boxing Day. I think everyone was the same.

"It’s quite typical that Boxing Days are like that, partly because people don’t think to access primary care early enough when they are ill, so they sit on their symptoms until they are very unwell. We had some long waits but we have managed. We put on extra nurses and doctors."

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