The list of city schools closed because of the H1N1 flu outbreak has grown to 16 today, in the wake of the city’s first H1N1-related fatality.

As of Monday afternoon, 16 schools in 12 school buildings were closed due to large amounts of students with flu-like symptoms.

Only one school, I.S. 238 in Corona, has confirmed cases of H1N1 flu.

Sources say two Queens schools – P.S. 19 in Corona and P.S. 209 in Whitestone – were closed today for a week.

P.S. 209 had 211 student absences and another 31 were sent home today due to flu-like symptoms, according to school sources. On Friday, the school had only 110 absences.

Earlier today, St. David’s Private School on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, seen above, voluntarily added its name to the list, in reaction to the high rate of student absences.

“We kept tracking over the weekend and more boys developed flu-like symptoms, so we decided the most responsible thing to do would be to close school today to get a good sense of what’s happening and just how many families are affected,” said Principal David O’Halloran of St. David’s.

Meantime, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and city health officials say their goal is to get help to people who will be the most affected by the flu.

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and teachers union president Randi Weingarten said they are closely monitoring schools where students have been absent because of flu symptoms.

“My staff is monitoring every single school in which we see a lot of kids getting sick, a drop in attendance, and where we see some confirmed cases,” said Weingarten.

“If your kid has a fever, keep your kid home. You don’t have to do any grievances — teachers who are not feeling well, stay home. This is not a time for us to worry about grievances. We got to worry first and foremost about the safety of our students and our staff,” said Klein.

They say they need parents to call into the school district’s hotline to explain why kids are staying home.

They have set up 11 hotlines, one for each district in Queens and one for each of the other boroughs.

Meanwhile, students and teachers mourned today the assistant principal at I.S. 238 who died of the flu.

A makeshift memorial in honor of 55-year-old Mitchell Wiener has been built outside the school.

Wiener had been hospitalized since Wednesday.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg expressed his sadness over the loss.

“Mr. Wiener was a dedicated educator, he was well liked by his students and he cared deeply about them. And his death really is a tragedy for our city and a terrible loss for the school community at I.S. 238,” said the mayor.

Wiener’s wife Bonnie, a teacher at I.S. 238, blamed the city for not acting sooner to close the school.

The family says Weiner had been taking high blood pressure medication and had been treated in the past for gout.

The head of the World Health Organization, Dr. Margaret Chan, is holding off on raising the world swine flu alert level.

Chan said the swine flu epidemic is in a “grace period” with the threat alert remaining at a phase 5 of 6.

Britain, Japan and other nations want to the agency to change how they determine that threat level.

They say the World Health Organization must consider how deadly the virus is, not just how fast it’s spreading.

Meantime, the number of people infected with H1N1 in Japan has exceeded 130. Most of them are teenagers, prompting the government to close 2,000 schools and cancel public events.

The flu has sickened almost 9,000 people in 40 countries,
and is to blame for at least 76 deaths.

Regular seasonal flu kills about 36,000 people in the United States each year.

Source: NY1