Sally Furniss
Well-known member
Updated at 5:16pm on 17 October 2009
About 50 Japanese students have been isolated in a Christchurch hotel with suspected swine flu.
The Canterbury District Health Board says five of the girls have been tested and have been found to have the virus, so it is likely all 50 are infected.
It's believed they carried the flu from Japan.
The students are among more than 200 15-year-olds on a cultural visit to New Zealand.
The others are being billeted in Hamilton, but the Canterbury DHB says they don't pose a risk as they're not showing symptoms and are being treated with Tamiflu.
The Christchurch schools which the sick teenagers visited are on alert for signs of illness in their own students.
United States swine flu deaths surge
Meanwhile health experts in the United States have warned of shortages in swine flu vaccine supplies as deaths from the virus climb above epidemic levels in most states.
A medical official Anne Schuchat says of the 40 million doses expected by the end of October, up to 30 million might be available.
She says most of the country is experiencing an unprecedented increase in the number of deaths, especially among children, from swine flu in the space of a few weeks.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2009/10/17/1245cdf0e806
About 50 Japanese students have been isolated in a Christchurch hotel with suspected swine flu.
The Canterbury District Health Board says five of the girls have been tested and have been found to have the virus, so it is likely all 50 are infected.
It's believed they carried the flu from Japan.
The students are among more than 200 15-year-olds on a cultural visit to New Zealand.
The others are being billeted in Hamilton, but the Canterbury DHB says they don't pose a risk as they're not showing symptoms and are being treated with Tamiflu.
The Christchurch schools which the sick teenagers visited are on alert for signs of illness in their own students.
United States swine flu deaths surge
Meanwhile health experts in the United States have warned of shortages in swine flu vaccine supplies as deaths from the virus climb above epidemic levels in most states.
A medical official Anne Schuchat says of the 40 million doses expected by the end of October, up to 30 million might be available.
She says most of the country is experiencing an unprecedented increase in the number of deaths, especially among children, from swine flu in the space of a few weeks.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2009/10/17/1245cdf0e806