California schools to get masks to curb swine flu
San Jose Mercury News
California school districts will receive 23 million masks and pairs of gloves to help curb the spread of swine flu, the state schools chief announced Friday. "We want to keep students, teachers and staff healthy and in school," Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell O'Connell said in a statement. Details of the program were being released at a Los Angeles County warehouse in Santa Fe Springs packed with boxes of disposable gloves and masks. The items, paid for by federal grants, will be shipped free to 58 county offices of education and to the Los Angeles Unified School District, which is the nation's second-largest district. They are intended for roughly 10,000 public schools with about 6.3 million students in more than 1,000 districts, said Hilary McLean, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Education. Shipping of the supplies began late last month, she said. (more...)