13 More Swine Flu Cases Confirmed in NYC

Thirteen more people have tested positive for swine flu in New York City, bringing the total number of cases to 62, the Health Department said Saturday.

The department is awaiting test results on 17 more probable cases from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Five of the confirmed cases are from Public School Q177 in Queens, where about a dozen students reported flu-like illnesses earlier this week. The school has been closed since Wednesday and plans to reopen on Wednesday. St. Francis, the nearby prep school where the first swine flu cluster was reported in New York City, is scheduled to reopen on Monday.

Swine flu news developed elsewhere across the tri-state on Saturday, with Connecticut reporting its second confirmed case of swine flu -- a child from Middlefield who recently went on a family trip to Mexico. The state has identified six additional probable cases up for confirmation by the CDC. The good news, however, is that all confirmed and probable cases have been mild and all the affected individuals have been making speedy recoveries. 

Health officials say they have found at least one person with swine flu who hadn't been to Mexico lately and isn't linked to a school that was the site of the biggest U.S. outbreak. Until this weekend, all cases in the state had connections either to either the school or Mexico or St. Francis, but one person is now confirmed to have the illness with known link to a cluster.

New York City health officials are still working to answer a number of pressing questions related to the swine flu outbreak, including why the infections spread so quickly through a Queens high school.

New York City has said as many as 1,000 people fell ill in connection with an outbreak at St. Francis school, but most of those people probably won't be tested to confirm the diagnosis.

The illness doesn't appear to have spread so quickly elsewhere. Authorities are still trying to figure out why.
    
City officials say they are looking at a wide range of factors, from whether the school's ventilation system played a role in spreading the virus, to whether the disease is less contagious as time goes on.

New York's Leadership Steps Up

New York's leadership was tested this week by the swine flu.
    
Gov. David Paterson fell into a golden political opportunity to try to capitalize on the big public health scare but gave straightforward briefings and let his health commissioner, Dr. Richard Daines, get most of the face time on TV.
    
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg heard Vice President Joe Biden say he'd discourage his family from taking the subway, so of course Bloomberg took the subway.
    
And Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith put the state and his family first and canceled his seat on his chamber's junket to Puerto Rico.
    
His daughter -- who attends St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens where the bulk of the nation's confirmed cases are -- fell ill along with hundreds of classmates. Smith said Friday the family was waiting for test results. His wife also complained of flu-like symptoms.

Not an Easy Call

It may seem like canceling a beach junket at a time of crisis is an easy call. But this is Albany, where annual budget crises don't interrupt spring break. The last time his conference went to Puerto Rico, in November, infighting and jockeying for lucrative leadership posts almost cost Smith his job.
    
"In some ways, it's the Rudy Giuliani mode of crisis management, and politicians generally look for a successful model,'' said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion in Poughkeepsie.
    
It's a fine line, perfected perhaps by the former Republican mayor's leadership after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But Bloomberg, Paterson and Smith last week walked it well.
    
"I took the subway here. I take the subway every day,'' Bloomberg told reporters at one of his daily briefings on the swine flu. "This flu does not seem to be taking over the city. There's no sense that being in a confined space would increase the risk dramatically.''
    
Paterson gave brief daily updates as well. Where he could have been frenetic, he was calm. Where he could have been self-focused, he delegated.
    
"In all likelihood, this is something that will just dissipate in the next couple of weeks,'' the Democrat said. "However, in that rare, rare case that it does not, we want to make sure that we're prepared.''
    
And it was a good handoff.
    
Daines, a former Mormon missionary to Bolivia, was compassionate yet direct, responsive yet calm. It was a bedside manner that worked well statewide.
    
"It seems to me, they are doing about what they ought to do,'' said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University poll. "Clearly given the 24-hour news cycle, given the fact that Washington keeps talking about this, they have to be perceived as on top of this. And, it seems to me, they are.''
    
David Catalfamo was an aide to Gov. George Pataki on Sept. 11, 2001. And although Sept. 11 was unique, Catalfamo said effective crisis management of all types depends not on media strategy, the ratings in polls or who gets to the microphone first.
    
"If you really are putting the peoples' interests first, if you really are empathetic and trying to connect in times of crisis, it comes through,'' Catalfamo said. "In that way, it really is kind of simple.''