Officials monitoring pneumonia cases

State health officials are monitoring three cases of pneumonia in the Eastern New Mexico area to see if each illness was spawned by influenza.

“It’s not abnormally high (number of cases) ... (but) the reason we’re monitoring it is because it’s related to the lung and there may be a viral connection and possibly related to the flu,” said state health department spokeswoman Kay Bird.

The state health department issued a press release last week confirming one Curry County man had died from the flu this year. State and local health officials say cases of the flu in Curry County and eastern New Mexico are about average this year.

There has been an increase in flu cases at nursing homes throughout the state, but Bird did not immediately know if there were any in the area.