Suspected swine flu closes Boston Latin School

By Stephen Smith, Globe Staff
and Elizabeth Cooney, Globe Correspondent

Boston's biggest public school, Boston Latin, will be shuttered for a week in hopes of halting a suspected outbreak of swine flu, city authorities announced today. The decision came after more than 250 students called in sick or were sent home because of respiratory symptoms.

In a hastily arranged City Hall press conference, Mayor Thomas M. Menino, flanked by his top health and school administrators, acknowledged that the move was inconvenient for Latin's 2,400 students and their families. But by tonight, definitive testing confirmed that one student has the disease, and preliminary results on a handful of other youths strongly suggested they, too, are infected.

Minutes after the temporary closing of Latin was announced, the Boston Public Health Commission disclosed that classes were also being suspended for a week at an all-girls private academy just blocks away, the Winsor School, after a cluster of flu symptoms emerged there. Today, 34 of 430 students were absent.

Earlier today, a private school in Wellesley, the Dana Hall School , cancelled classes for a week after 100 students and teachers developed fevers, sore throats, and other flu-like symptoms.

At Boston Latin, by far the largest of the schools to close, the effect was sweeping. Achievement tests were delayed. Participation in track, crew, and other athletic events was suspended. A performance with the Boston Pops will go silent, and the junior prom will be postponed. The message to students and their parents was unequivocal: stay away from school and, as much as possible, stay away from each other.

"In a way, it's nice to know they're worried about us, " said Wilhelmina Moen, a freshman from Brighton. "Obviously, you have to be careful. It's the same thing as the other flu. That flu kills, too."

The decision to close schools reflects the fluid response to the virus, known as H1N1, which was first detected in Massachusetts late last month. It is also evidence of the rapid migration of a germ that has disproportionately struck the young, causing substantial discomfort but rarely resulting in life-threatening complications.

The arrival of swine flu has severely tested school and health authorities' ability to respond in a way that balances the need to act prudently but without stoking panic or causing unwarranted disruptions. Initially, hundreds of schools were shuttered nationally, even if only a case or two was reported.

Once doctors recognized that the virus was not causing widespread death or disability, they tempered their recommendations, saying that in most cases, the best way to stop the virus' spread was by simply keeping sick children at home.

Still, local school districts were given broad latitude, and disease specialists said there was one circumstance when closing would be warranted: if a large cluster of students and staff fell ill.

At Dana Hall, nearly one-fifth of students -- including some who live on campus -- were absent Monday. "This means that not only do students spend a lot more time in close contact with each other, but others are coming and going," said Shepard Cohen, chairman of the Wellesley health department. "This makes for a unique situation and the school decided to be extra cautious, which seems like the right attitude to take."

Other schools remained open even as the flu tally rose. At Newton's Oak Hill Middle School, for example, about 90 students, or 16 percent of the school population, called in sick today. But classes are continuing. Newton School Committee member Dori Zaleznik said the absence rate is similar to the regular flu season.

In the case of Boston Latin, Menino and his top lieutenants went to great pains to emphasize that classes were cancelled only after a comprehensive investigation and detailed discussions.

"This is not a time to panic, but it is a time to be cautious," Menino said. "We didn't make this decision lightly, but we are doing this for their well-being."

On a typical day, about 70 students are absent from classes at Latin, the imposing exam school that sits in the middle of Boston's Longwood neighborhood and has students in the seventh through 12th grades. But on Monday more than 200 were out, said Boston School Superintendent Carol Johnson.

That was the first major clue of a significant problem brewing. City disease specialists were sufficiently concerned -- especially in the wake of significant swine flu outbreaks in New York schools -- that four investigators were dispatched Monday to Latin. Calls were placed to parents of some ailing students, and the responses were startling: Of 75 families contacted, 55 reported their children had symptoms that are the hallmark of the flu, Johnson said.

And by today, the roster of absences swelled to roughly 250, with 20 students sent home because of symptoms.

"We wanted to make sure we proceeded with significant caution," Johnson said, "to stop whatever spread might occur."

As a result, MCAS math tests scheduled for this week for 10th-graders have been deferred until next Wednesday and Thursday. Similarly, advanced placement exams scheduled for this week are expected to be administered after classes resume May 27. Johnson said conversations with state education administrators have indicated that Latin students will not be required to make up the lost days.

An automated telephone message informed students' families Monday night that cases of swine flu were suspected at the school. That caused some buzz in the hallways in the morning, said Eddie Lui, a freshman from the South End. "Everybody," he said, was worried about getting it."

A public address announcement made during the last class today heralded the news: no school for seven days.

Tatiana Joyce, a sophomore from East Boston who volunteers in the school nurse's office, wasn't surprised. She said more students than usual were coming in this week with mild fever and other flu-like symptoms. Closing the school made sense to her. "It's not that drastic," she said. "It's nothing to worry about -- it's seven days for people to heal up."

Globe correspondents Ben Terris and Calvin Hennick contributed to this report.
Stephen Smith can be reached at stsmith@globe.com