Philippine health authorities confirmed 123 more Influenza A/H1N1 cases on Thursday, bringing the total to 727 in the country.

The newly-found cases, all mild in nature, involved 120 Filipinos and three foreigners, Health Secretary Francisco Duque told reporters. Twenty-one of the patients had a history of travel to a country affected with the novel virus.

Meanwhile, the health chief reported that 85 more A/H1N1 patients have fully recovered. This new number brought the total count of fully-recovered cases to 536 or 74 percent of the total sum of confirmed cases since May 21.

Duque said there is no need to panic although the cases kept rising.

"Most can fight off this novel virus even without medications or hospitalization. If you have mild flu-like symptoms but you do not have any pre-existing medical condition then there is no reason to be alarmed. Just stay home and take plenty of fluids, vitamins and bed rest," Duque told the public.

However, he advised "high-risk groups" to take the disease seriously.

"We want to make it clear that high-risk groups, once they have the flu symptoms, should immediately go to their doctor," Duque said, referring to patients with uncontrolled diabetes and asthma, those with chronic liver and kidney disease, the people suffering from HIV/AIDs and TB, and pregnant women and the very young and the elderly.

"They should not wait for their symptoms to worsen because the yare prone to many infections other than the novel virus such as our seasonal flu strains," he added.

(Xinhua News Agency June 25, 2009)