GILROY
Rucker Elementary School will be closed tomorrow now that seven students in the same fourth grade class are exhibiting symptoms of swine flu, according to Gilroy Unified School District Superintendent Deborah Flores. Three children in other classes also reported flu-like symptoms.
These are the only cases at any of the district schools, she said. None of the other schools have reported students with flu-like symptoms.
At least one Rucker student is being tested for the swine flu and the district is waiting anxiously to receive the results from the Santa Clara County Public Health Department, Flores said. The district still does not have any confirmed cases of swine flu, which would cause county health officials would give the order to shut down any schools where confirmed cases are found. Closing Rucker is a “preventative measure at this point that will give us time to get the results,” she said.
Meanwhile, county health officials spent Thursday awaiting test results from Saint Louise Regional Hospital after a “little snafu” there delayed a student’s culture, said school district and health department representatives.
An unrelated error during testing at Saint Louise Regional Hospital delayed the Rucker student’s results, and county staff have since labeled the sample a “high priority” – meaning scientists will evaluate the sample ahead of dozens taken from throughout the county, said Molly Carbajal, a Santa Clara County Public Health Department spokesperson. The label does not have to do with any particular suspicion about the results.
While health officials wait to hear about the one Rucker student, an additional five students with symptoms have been referred to doctors. Debbie Flores said a 13-year-old middle school student – who lives with the girl from Rucker – was one of the six with symptoms, but that he does not attend a Gilroy public school.
Federal health officials believe the flu, which regularly affects pigs but rarely humans, originated in Mexico, and they are concerned because it is a new virus for which people have little or no immunity and no vaccine. In addition to being the suspect cause in more than 2,000 illnesses and 150 deaths in Mexico, the flu has infected 109 people in America and killed in in Texas, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Ga. Responding to the virus’ rapid spread, the World Health Organization’s director-general, Margaret Chan, raised the organization’s alert level from phase four to phase five Wednesday, signifying that a flu pandemic was imminent.
“At this stage, effective and essential measures include heightened surveillance, early detection and treatment of cases, and infection control in all health facilities,” according to the WHO Web site.
County officials expect the Rucker student’s results this afternoon from Saint Louise, Carbajal said, as the health center has had the Rucker girl’s sample for more than 24 hours. Saint Louise ER physicians tested the student Wednesday morning, but “everybody” at the hospital authorized to speak to the media was in a meeting Thursday morning, according to the hospital’s phone operator who said, “There’s kind of a situation going on here.” She did not elaborate, and messages left with the hospital’s CEO and other representatives were not immediately returned. Hospital spokesperson Jasmine Nguyen wrote in an e-mail that she was “unable to confirm any information” as of 12 p.m., and county health officials remained equally reticent.
“We are not releasing information about hospital patients due to patient confidentiality, and right now we’re treating this as a suspected case,” Carbajal said. “If it comes back as a probable case – which precedes a confirmed case – we will work with all the hospitals to make sure staff follow infection control measures.”
If the results come back as a probable case, the school district would shut down Rucker – which serves a rural population of 640 primarily Hispanic students in northern and eastern Gilroy – at the county’s behest, Flores said. The girl at Rucker also lives with a boy – whose name was also forwarded to county officials – that attends a district school, and if the girl’s test results come back probable, that school could be shut down as well.
As of Thursday afternoon, county health officials have identified six probable cases of swine flu in San Jose and Santa Clara and have forwarded them to the CDC for confirmation. There have been no confirmed cases in the county out of 99 tested as of 1 p.m. Thursday. The six probable cases in Santa Clara County do not include the possible Gilroy cases.
Aside from the 14 confirmed cases in California – mostly in the southern region of the state – at least 109 Americans have contracted swine flu, including a 23-month-old child from Mexico who died from the illness while in Houston, Tex. Also hard hit have been South Carolina and New York.
Even the school district’s head nurse, Eileen Obata, was still waiting for more information from county officials.
“They’re not telling me anything. I asked if the results would be ready in 24, 48 hours, but I can’t get any answers. It’s all wait and see,” Obata said. “I haven’t been called today. I’m amazed.”
Reporter Sara Suddes contributed reporting to this article.
