May 20, 2009 8:30 am US/Eastern
13 New Confirmed Cases Of H1N1 In Nassau County
4-Year-Old Hospitalized; Valley Stream School Closed
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
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DNA test kits of the the influenza A(H1N1) or Swine Flu virus prepared by PrimerDesign Ltd are displayed at the company laboratory in Southampton on May 2, 2009.
Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images
Health officials on Long Island are reporting 13 new confirmed cases of swine flu in Nassau County, including a 4-year-old child who has been hospitalized.
It will be an especially long Memorial Day weekend for students who attend Memorial Junior High School in Valley Stream. The school is closed on Wednesday until next Tuesday after eight students were confirmed to be swine flu victims.
Four other students diagnosed with swine flu by the Nassau County Health Department attend other schools in Valley Stream as well. Memorial Junior High is the only school believed to be closed on Long Island, but in New York City the number is growing, including 19 schools in Queens, two in the Bronx, one in Brooklyn and three in Manhattan.
At Horace Mann in Riverdale, parents applauded the decision because of the abnormally high number of absent students.
"We have total confidence that the school knows what it's doing," said a Horace Mann School parent.
Meanwhile, a 4-year-old child from Freeport is currently hospitalized. Nassau County Department of Health officials say the Freeport child was hospitalized after becoming ill on May 11 with fever, cough and congestion. Officials say the child and family had traveled to Mexico.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and city health officials say they are monitoring every school and are handling closures on a case by case basis.
"Kids are absent from school for a variety of reasons. We are focusing on kids that are identified by the school nurse as having documented high fever. That's the main indicator we're looking at," said Deputy Health Commissioner Adam Karpati.
"There are no right answers and getting the data is as difficult as making a decision on what to do with it," said Bloomberg on Tuesday.
A swine flu vaccine appears to be more difficult to creat than experts first thought, the World Health Organization acknowledged Tuesday as U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and WHO chief Dr. Margaret Chan met with pharmaceutical companies.
Health officials from around the world are attending WHO's annual meeting in Geneva this week to discuss the outbreak that has infected 9,000 people in over 40 countries, killing 76 of them.
Flu experts have told WHO that vaccine manufacturers will not be ready to produce a swine flu vaccine until mid-July at the earliest, WHO reported Tuesday. Previously, WHO officials had thought production could start in late May.
Experts also found no evidence that regular flu vaccines offer any protection against swine flu.
Symptoms of the swine flu include fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue. Some people have reported diarrhea and vomiting as well. Anyone experiencing severe symptoms, such as difficulty breathing, should seek health care and treatment. The best way to prevent additional cases of flu in schools is to stay home when sick, cover your mouth when coughing and sneezing, and wash hands frequently.
For those who are ill, the recommendation is to stay home until they are symptom-free for at least 24 hours.
Eating pork or pork products cannot spread the swine flu.
Q&A: What Is Swine Flu?
CDC Swine Flu Facts Sheet
Learn At Home Student Guides
CBS News Interactive: Fighting The Flu
CDC Emergency Updates Via Twitter
Swine Flu Twitter Live Search Results
David Burnia's Swine Flu Watch On Twitter
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