1 confirmed case of swine flu in Quebec

Quebec's Public Health Agency has confirmed the province's first case of swine flu.

Director Dr. Alain Poirier said a man from the Montreal area who recently travelled to Mexico has contracted the strain of influenza virus currently circulating in several countries and believed to have originated in Mexico. The man is home now with a mild case of the flu.

"Lab tests confirmed the diagnosis," Poirier said in a news conference Thursday afternoon. "So that person and likely his or her family members will be advised to stay at home for the next seven days, until their contagion period is over."

Poirier said public health officials are also tracking three other suspicious infections that may have been caused by the same virus, which has been identified as a new strain of a type A swine influenza virus of the subtype known as H1N1.

Health officials said they aren't surprised the virus has reached Quebec but called for calm and said preparations are in place.

"The major emphasis that we have — because we do expect it — is to minimize the transmission and certainly to minimize the transmission to our health-care workers," said Dr. Mark Miller at the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal.

"We must protect our health-care workers, at all costs."

Expanded quarantine facilities will be ready by the end of the week at the Jewish General, he said.

In the worst-case scenario, the ambulance garage can be converted to house extra patients.

Schools in the Montreal area are taking measures to ensure students have the least possible chance of contracting the flu.

Laurier MacDonald High School officials cancelled a weekend trip to New York for 48 students and six teachers, who were scheduled to leave Friday.

Hundreds of New York City school children are believed to be sick with the flu.

"What we were seeing in New York was an escalation in the numbers of people affected, and we felt, even with the remotest risk – and I'm sure the risk would have been extremely remote – we felt it best to cancel," said English Montreal School Board chairperson Angela Mancini.

The board has sent information pamphlets home with students that include "a list of some of the symptoms," she said. "We've asked parents to keep their children home if they are showing any signs. We're making sure the kids pay extra attention to the washing of their hands, for example."

Earlier this week, Laval University imposed a travel moratorium on trips to Mexico, California and Texas for students and staff as a precautionary measure.