New Zealand : Swine flu has hit Motueka High School

Via Stuff :

" Swine flu has hit Motueka High School hard with almost a quarter of its students away sick with the virus.

On Friday the school had 138 students out of 589 away, the majority with cold and flu symptoms.

Nelson Marlborough Medical Officer of Health, Dr Jill Sherwood said limited samples taken from students confirmed H1N1 was in the school. It was doing extra cleaning of hard surfaces and had alcohol hand-sanitiser in all classes.

However, other Nelson schools didn't seem to be as badly affected.

Victory School principal Mark Brown said the virus "hadn't been terribly noticeable".

"We've certainly had children away ... up to 10 in some classes, including staff, but they've been a rarity rather than across the school," he said. "I couldn't say that it was swine flu either – there's been tummy upsets, head colds. Just the normal winter stuff. Thank goodness."