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The National Security and Defense Council has arrived at a decision that urgent reform of the sanitary-and-epidemiologic service of Ukraine must be carried out.

National Security and Defense Council Secretary Raisa Bohatyriova said this on the Ukraina TV channel on Friday evening.

"We have a final decision that the sanitary-and-epidemiologic service must be re-equipped urgently, its work must be re-built, the staff must be selected to find people capable of taking steps adequate to the situation [with A(H1N1) flu]," she said.

According to her, the National Security and Defense Council on October 30 endorsed a decision to hold a special meeting of the NSDC to consider a new architecture of the State Sanitary-And-Epidemiologic Service to meet European standards.

Bohatyriova said the death cases from flu was the result of the inadequate system for selection of staff in the sanitary-and-epidemiologic service.

As Ukrainian News earlier reported, the Ukrainian Health Ministry has confirmed 34 deaths from flu and acute respiratory viral diseases in Ternopil region, Ivano-Frankivsk region, and Lviv region from October 19 until 21:30 of October 30.

The Health Ministry on October 30 declared the A(H1N1) flu epidemic throughout Ukraine.