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Schools in Urumqi remain closed amid A(H1N1) scare

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-09-07 19:44

URUMQI: Primary and secondary schools in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, remained closed Monday in the wake of recent outbreak of 43 A(H1N1) influenza cases.

At an emergency meeting on Sunday, the city's education department ordered all schools to remain closed Monday and Tuesday, said Urumqi's education chief Hu Junhai.

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On Saturday Xinjiang confirmed its first A(H1N1) flu case, a student at the No. 70 Middle School. By Saturday night, health authorities confirmed 42 more cases, saying all had been in close contact with the student.

The health department refused to give details of the patients. A Xinhua reporter visiting the regional hospital for epidemic diseases on Sunday saw two were teachers from the No. 70 Middle School and most others were teenager.

Another 123 people who had been in contact with the patients were feverish and sought medication, the regional health department said Monday.

It said 38 of them were hospitalized for treatment or observation.

The health department has sent 42 work teams to oversee disease prevention work at Urumqi's schools.

A(H1N1) flu cases have been on the rise since China's schools began the fall semester last Tuesday.

A total of 40 students have been confirmed as having contracted the virus at Xi'an University of Arts and Science, with 11 new cases reported on Monday.

The patients were in stable condition and none of the cases was life-threatening, a spokesman with the provincial health department said.

Students who had been in close contact with the patients have been put in seven-day quarantine on campus. Classes were suspended at the university on Friday and will resume only if no new case is confirmed for seven consecutive days.

On Sunday, 27 cases were confirmed at three schools in the southwestern Chongqing Municipality, 67 at four universities in the development zone of Langfang city near Beijing, 10 at a middle school in Sichuan Province, and 35 at three schools in Shandong Province.

A(H1N1) 'flu outbreaks have also been reported at schools in other regions, including the provinces of Henan, Hunan, Jiangsu, Anhui and Hainan, as well as the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

By last Friday night, 4,415 cases of A(H1N1) flu had been reported on the Chinese mainland, of which 3,577 have recovered.