June 12 (Bloomberg) -- The first flu pandemic in four decades is sweeping across the globe and people in Melbourne, one of the hardest-hit cities, have one thing to say: So what.

“It’s the flu, it comes and goes,” said Gavin Dufty, 46, a social researcher in Australia’s second-largest city. “This one just happens to have a different name.” Locals “are taking it in their stride. It doesn’t seem that severe.”

Melbourne and the rest of Victoria, a state the size of Kansas, have more than 1,000 cases of swine flu and officials said last week so many people have the bug they stopped counting. Evidence that the virus has taken root there, as well as in Chile, the U.K. and five other countries, prompted the World Health Organization to move to the top of its pandemic alert scale yesterday.

Melbourne’s response suggests the WHO’s announcement won’t be met with panic, as some governments predicted. Margaret Chan, the WHO’s director-general, is trying to navigate a path between raising alarm about a virus that in most cases causes little more than a fever and a cough and underestimating a bug that could kill millions.

“This is not a time to be complacent,” Chan said on a conference call yesterday.

Emergency Plans

A pandemic announcement may trigger emergency plans around the world, the U.K.’s Department of Health said last month. Experts also warned it could spur countries to restrict travel and ban public events. That’s why the WHO spent the past 10 days encouraging governments not to overreact. The disease has turned out milder than it first appeared in April in Mexico, where it killed 106 people.

The virus, a new strain that’s evolved in pigs, humans and birds, has sickened 28,774 people and killed 141 worldwide. The WHO estimates seasonal flu causes up to 500,000 deaths a year.

“One of the critical issues is that we do not want people to over-panic if they hear that we are in a pandemic situation,” Keiji Fukuda, Chan’s assistant for health security and environment, told reporters on a conference call June 9.

Since reaching Australia last month, the bug has caused 25 hospitalizations, Health Minister Nicola Roxon told reporters yesterday. Four patients remain in intensive care in Victoria state, she said. No deaths have been reported.

Melbourne, with 3.8 million people, is providing a window on what the U.S. and Europe can expect when the weather turns colder this year. Flu trackers are watching for any sign the disease is worsening as it circulates during the Southern Hemisphere’s winter, becoming more deadly and supplanting seasonal flu.

‘Still Shopping’

“We will be able to see that in Australia, if anywhere,” said Sharon Lewin, head of infectious diseases at the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne. “There are lots of theories circulating about why we have so many cases here. I don’t think anybody really knows. It’s winter, the air is drier, you’re in greater proximity to other people -- a better environment for spread.”

Most people with the bug get symptoms like those of seasonal flu, said Lewin, whose hospital has screened about 500 people for the infection and typically treats hundreds for flu complications each winter. Swine flu tends to infect younger people and spreads more easily, according to Lewin.

“It’s been a pretty mild disease and there’s been a lot of reassurance from health authorities,” she said. “The public are almost saying, ‘what’s the big deal?’”

Tens of thousands of people have probably caught the bug in Victoria, Lewin estimates. Locals “are still shopping, they’re still hanging out together,” said Daryl Davies, a 62-year-old retiree. “We went to a movie a couple days ago, it was full.” Davies, like Dufty, spoke outside Melbourne’s Flinders Street Station, one of the city’s busiest pedestrian areas.

Spanish Flu

WHO has urged countries not to implement pandemic response plans designed for a more severe threat after government leaders said last month that moving to phase 6, the highest alert phase declared by the agency yesterday, may spur some countries to restrict travel, ban public events and adopt other measures that aren’t needed for mild flu, worsening the deepest economic slump since the Great Depression.

“In terms of preparedness, we’re okay,” Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told the Seven Network Ltd.’s Sunrise program today. “A lot of Australians travel internationally and, as a result, we’ve got some challenges to deal with. This is a strong form of influenza and we need to be very careful.”

When people hear the word pandemic, they “think that these are life-threatening situations,” said Wayne Kayler-Thomson, chief executive officer of the Victorian Employers’ Chamber of Commerce and Industry. “As the threat has emerged, it seems to be not as serious as what perhaps we were led to believe.”

Tourism Impact

Advisories by countries including Singapore recommending against non-essential travel to Victoria have prompted tourists to shelve holidays to Melbourne and cancel public events, damaging the state’s A$10 billion ($8.1 billion) tourism industry, Kayler-Thomson said.

Previous pandemics have encircled the globe in two or three waves. The 1918 Spanish flu, the most deadly of all, started out so mild that the warning signal was missed, Chan told the United Nations General Assembly last month. It eventually killed more than 40 million people.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jason Gale in Melbourne at j.gale@bloomberg.net; Madelene Pearson at mpearson1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: June 11, 2009 22:55 EDT