Plymouth HS students, staffers advised to self-isolate following trip to Italy, schools closed for sanitation

PLYMOUTH, MASS. (WHDH) - Plymouth high school students and their chaperones who recently traveled to Italy are being advised to self-isolate after one student developed flu-like symptoms amid the coronavirus outbreak. Now, school officials are canceling class Friday to sanitize all potentially infected surfaces.

As a precaution, all students and chaperones who traveled to Italy with the high schools have been asked to stay home and self-isolate and all 12 schools will be closed Friday for cleaning, Plymouth Public Schools Superintendent Gary Maestas announced.

The group visited Milan, Italy, during February vacation and one student who went on the trip was evaluated at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital late Wednesday evening for flu-like symptoms,.

The student was released and will continue to be monitored, Maestas added.

The students from the town’s north and south high schools returned to the United States two weeks ago. At that time, the CDC did not require travelers from Italy to stay home and monitor their health for 14 days, so they all returned to school.

The students were told to stay home Thursday. Monday will mark 14 days since their return.

“I think it’s a good choice to disinfect the schools because we don’t want it spreading considering there’s 12 schools with hundreds of thousands of students,” student Anna Daley said.

Plymouth Public Schools has been in contact with their partner school in Milan, which has had no reported cases of coronavirus as of Thursday morning, Maestas said.

“We will continue to work in conjunction with the Plymouth Board of Health, local and state agencies to help guide us through this recent development,” Maestas continued.

The district has contracted a professional cleaning company that specializes in these matters to disinfect all 12 buildings in addition to school buses on Friday.

He said this will be done out of an abundance of caution and that he takes the school responsibility to their students seriously.

Maestas stressed that there are no confirmed cases of the virus in the district.

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