Thirty Florida high school students are being kept home after a trip to Connecticut where they have been exposed to a Chinese student who had become ill with the flu and is being tested for the coronavirus.
The Benjamin School in Palm Beach County had taken the students and three teachers to a Yale Model United Nations event and the school says that until test results come back from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the affected students and chaperones will stay away from the Palm Beach Gardens campus.
Here is a statement from Dr. Thomas Matese, Medical Director at the Benjamin School:
“We have been in contact with officials from the Health Department. We have determined that the risk of potential transmission of the coronavirus to our students is exceedingly low. Out of an abundance of caution, we are requiring students and chaperones who attended the Yale Model United Nations event to stay home from school today."
Test results on the Chinese student are expected back by the middle of this week.
The North Palm Beach campus of the Benjamin School, which is for lower and middle schools, did not have students at the event.
The CDC is warning that people should not travel to China, where the death toll has risen to 106. There are 50 cases confirmed outside the country, including five in the U.S., though there are no confirmed cases of coronavirus in Florida.
Photo: Getty Images