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Federal health authorities are still downplaying Australia's swine flu outbreak, despite reports of a possible outbreak at a Queensland prison.
Dozens of inmates at the Lotus Glen Correctional Centre are being treated with Tamiflu after a 34-year-old inmate tested positive to the virus.
It is feared up to 70 prisoners may have the flu.
It comes after a 45-year-old man with underlying medical conditions died in a western Sydney's Nepean hospital. It is the first recorded death in New South Wales.
The first child has also died from the virus in Victoria.
Ms Roxon told reporters that she could not comment on the case because it was being investigated by police and the coroner.
'The death of any child is a tragedy,' Ms Roxon said.
'There are police and coronial inquiries being undertaken and it is simply not appropriate for me to make any comment on the case.
'I want to assure people that they should not be unduly alarmed.
'This is a serious disease and it can be severe in some people but it is mild overall for most people.'
She said for most children swine flu is mild and they recover without any medical intervention.
So far 10 people in Australia have died while having swine flu although all have had an underlying health issue, but Ms Roxon would not say on Thursday if the three-year-old boy had other health problems.
The family have requested the boy's medical history not be released.
Earlier on Thursday, a leading disease expert suggested that twice as many children will die of swine flu in the next 12 months compared to the number of deaths from regular influenza.
But Robert Booy believes the number of deaths will still be fairly small - around 10 or 12 in a year.
Three to six children die every year from regular influenza, he says.
'It (death from swine flu) can occur in a healthy child although most of them we believe will occur in a child with a problem, say a chronic heart problem, long-standing lung, kidney, liver (problems) or diabetes,' Prof Booy told ABC radio.
'The likelihood is with this virus we'll see more of the small number of severe (cases) than we do normally.'
Prof Booy is the co-director of the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance of Vaccine Preventable Diseases at The Children's Hospital at Westmead in Sydney.
'In the most part it's mild but it's a double-truth,' Prof Booy said of swine flu.
'You're always going to get a small number of very serious cases as we've seen with adult deaths and we expect to have some children dying too.'
