Dusseldorf - The Japanese school in Dusseldorf has been closed following an outbreak of swine flu which has infected at least 30 pupils, officials in the west German city said Thursday. Nearly all the cases involved children aged 12, said Heiko Schneitler, head of the Dusseldorf Health Office. Most of the cases were not severe, but one child required hospital treatment, he said.
All the affected students have been placed in quarantine at home with their families, Schneitler said, adding the number of infections was expected to rise because other children had complained of flu symptoms.
Some 30 teachers and 560 students are at the school, which will remain closed until the end of next week, school officials said.
The outbreak raised to more than 100 the number of swine flu cases in Germany, Europe's most populous nation.
Around 8,000 Japanese live in Dusseldorf, home to the largest Japanese community in the country.
The first case involved a six-year-old who had just returned from a holiday with his parents on a Mediterranean island and might have contracted the H1N1 swine flu virus at the airport, Schneitler said.
The other cases involved a group of six-graders who were on a school trip by bus from Wednesday to Friday last week. On their return some complained of chills and fever.
Health authorities said they would conduct swine flu tests on other students and their families Thursday.
In the meantime, the families under quarantine were being cared for by other members of the Japanese community.
Latest figures by the World Health Organization show that 74 countries have reported 27,737 cases of infection, including 141 deaths.
Most of the cases, and nearly all the deaths, were in North America.
In Europe, the most affected countries are Britain with 666 cases and Spain with 331.
