Thai health officials said today that a baby had been born in Thailand with H1N1 flu having contracted the virus while still in the womb.

The baby was born prematurely on Saturday, when doctors decided to deliver it by caesarean section seven months into the pregrancy of a 24-year-old mother who was found to be infected with the flu virus.

"The baby is stable. We are now figuring out how it got infected. This is the only case of infection from mother to unborn baby that we have had," said Dr Suriya Coohahrat, a senior health official in Ratchaburi province, where the woman was first admitted to hospital.

The mother is still very ill in hospital.

Another doctor was quoted in local media as saying three cases of mother-to-child transmission of H1N1 had been reported in the United States.

Thailand had reported 44 deaths from H1N1 and more than 6,700 infections as of July 22, the highest number in Southeast Asia.

The Nation newspaper reported that the Public Health ministry would announce the death toll had risen to 66 at its weekly update tomorrow.

The World Health Organisation declared an H1N1 influenza pandemic on June 11. The new virus has killed more than 800 people worldwide since it emerged in April

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.