BOGOTA - A 24-YEAR-OLD woman has become the first person in Colombia to die of swine flu, the A(H1N1) virus which first emerged in Mexico in April and has killed more than 140 people worldwide.

'We have our first case of a patient who has died, according to doctors, linked to the presence of the virus,' Health Minister Diego Palacio told a press conference Tuesday, adding that 35 cases of swine flu had been registered in the country.

Two members of the woman's family - her husband and an eight-year-old son - have also come down with swine flu, while another son age four was being tested for the virus.

The death, which occured last Thursday in a hospital south of the capital Bogota, is the third in South America, following two fatalities in Chile, the continent's hardest-hit nation. Seven countries have now recorded deaths from the virus.

Flu experts are watching the situation in South America carefully as it is in the southern hemisphere which is entering the flu-prone winter season.

Chile on Tuesday recorded a surge in the number of swine flu cases to 1,694, a 90-per cent increase from the 890 confirmed infections reported on Saturday.

In neighbouring Brazil, nine new cases were confirmed, bring to 40 the number of people sickened by the virus, the health ministry said.

But it stressed in a statement that 'transmission in Brazil is limited and there is no evidence of sustained, person-to-person transmission of A(H1N1) flu virus.'

In Ecuador, which also shares a border with Colombia, the number of swine flu cases rose by nine since Saturday to a total of 67. The new infections were in people who arrived in the country from the United States, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and the Dominican Republic.

And in Paraguay the number of confirmed cases rose by 20 to a total of 25, following official announcement earlier this week of the country's first swine flu infections. -- AFP