China is treating eight British schoolchildren for swine flu and has quarantined 107 more after they contracted the virus on an educational trip, the Foreign Office said today.
The first news of the cases came at the weekend, but the number of pupils kept in quarantine doubled in the Foreign Office statement today. Another Briton, unconnected to the schools visit, is also hospitalised with swine flu.
The teenagers, seven from London and one from Somerset, were diagnosed in Beijing.
Three were taken to hospital directly from the airport on Tuesday and the others a few days into their stay.
Jackie Barnett, whose son Matthew has contracted the virus, said: "Three of his friends were taken straight to the hospital from the airport.
"I got a phonecall from his headteacher saying Matthew was taken ill on Friday.
"I think he's ok but he's a bit homesick now. He is being treated quite well but we don't know when he can come home because they don't know if anyone else will be taken ill over there."
The quarantined group was among a party of around 600 British students and teachers from across the UK who had travelled to China for a two-week language and cultural immersion trip.
China has introduced some of the world's most stringent measures to control swine flu, since being criticised in the past for not doing enough to combat the spread of diseases — particularly the 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
Officials in masks board arriving international flights and check each passenger's temperature. It is checked again as they pass through the airport.
"Very little information is provided. Some passengers find the process confusing and upsetting," warns the Foreign Office guidance about the screening, quarantine and treatment procedures.
"If any passenger has flu-like symptoms this may lead to all passengers being quarantined for up to seven days, until health officials are satisfied all are free of the A(H1N1) virus."
China's Health Ministry said last Friday that 1,537 cases of swine flu had been reported. None has been fatal.
A group of American students who had travelled to China for a volleyball camp are quarantined at the same hotel as the British teenagers.
The US Embassy's spokeswoman Susan Stevenson said the embassy was "aware of several cases at the moment".
She added that about 1,800 Americans had been quarantined in China since the swine flu measures began in early May, of whom 200 people tested positive for swine flu.
