VANCOUVER, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- The A/H1N1 flu has hit more than 100 people in remote aboriginal communities on Vancouver Island, Canada's province of British Columbia, the Canadian Medical Association Journal(CMAJ) reported Thursday, which described the situation as the first fall pandemic of the deadly virus in the country.

    But B.C. health officials slammed the report, saying it was inaccurate.

    According the CMAJ report, John Armstrong, a family physician on Vancouver Island, said he has treated "dozens" of cases of people infected with the virus.

    He said the outbreak is such that the province's public health lab in Vancouver recently instructed him to stop sending swabs, having confirmed that all of the samples he had already forwarded were, in fact, positive for the A/H1N1 virus.

    Armstrong said most of the cases he has handled have been "fairly mild " and treatable with antiviral drug Tamiflu, adding that "most of the people I have been seeing are younger adults, between 20 and 40, some teenagers."

    The largest outbreak occurred in Ahousat, the principal settlement on Flores Island off the west coast of Vancouver Island, which is accessible only by water or air. But other communities in the area also appear to be affected.

    Aboriginal communities have long-standing troubles as poverty, chronic health problems and poor housing conditions, which provide an ideal breading ground for a flu virus.

    A "big community effort kept a lid on that," as aboriginal leaders and health officials held public meetings and urged measures to contain the spread, Amstrong said.

    A B.C. health official on Thursday said the CMAJ report exaggerated the situations, local media reported.

    "I actually found that reporting not only irresponsible, but inflammatory," said Charmaine Enns, a medical health officer with the Vancouver Island Health Authority." There was no securing the facts before that was printed, so I find that really unfortunate."

    Acknowledging that health officials had known for weeks about A/H1N1 cases in remote aboriginal communities, Enns said that increase in "the level of alarm and anxiety" is completely "unfounded."

    Poverty, chronic health problems and poor housing conditions have long troubled aboriginal communities, which provide an ideal breading ground for a flu virus.

Special Report:  World Tackles A/H1N1 Flu