Thaindian News

Jalandhar, June 16 (IANS) Two more students with swine flu symptoms were hospitalised in this Punjab city Tuesday and their blood samples sent to the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) in New Delhi for tests, officials said. Nine of their schoolmates have already been quarantined.
They were part of a group of 31 students and three teachers of the Guru Amar Das Public School that went to New York and Florida on an educational trip to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

“Two students with suspected swine flu were admitted here Tuesday. They had travelled along with other infected students in the same flight,” Roop Lal, Jallandhar district health officer, told IANS.

Of the nine students admitted to the civil hospital Sunday, seven tested positive for the infection while the reports of the other two are still awaited.

“The seven students who tested positive for influenza A (H1N1) yesterday (Monday) have been kept in isolation wards and are under constant observation. We would get the test reports of suspected cases by today evening,” said Roop Lal.

He added that the district officials are preparing a list of people who came in contact with the infected students before they were hospitalised.

The 31 students of the Guru Amar Das Public School and their three escorting teachers returned from the US trip to New Delhi Saturday aboard a Qatar Airlines flight via Doha.

One them, a Class 12 student, tested positive for the swine flu virus in New Delhi. He was admitted to a Delhi hospital Saturday immediately after landing at the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA).

The rest of the group travelled to Jalandhar by road.

“The school administration and health authorities acted very irresponsibly in this matter. After the detection of the first case in Delhi, they should not have allowed the rest of the group to travel without properly diagnosing them,” said a relative of a student admitted here.

This is probably the first instance in India of a group of individuals catching the infection.

“We have also identified eight other passengers of Qatar Airlines, six of whom are from Punjab, who came in contact with the infected students. We have advised them to take required precautions and to immediately report to the doctor in case they detect any symptom of swine flu,” said a health official here.