Japan today shut down more than 4000 schools to contain an outbreak of swine flu as most of the cases of the A(H1N1) virus are high school students.
Authorities have closed down around 4043 schools– double the previous day — to slow the spread of swine flu, which has so far infected 173 people in the country–the fourth largest national figure on the world infection table.
Many people in the affected urban areas were wearing face masks after the western cities of Kobe and Osaka became the first in Japan to suffer domestic outbreaks of the virus, which spread rapidly through two schools.

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