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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Monday, May 18, 2009

New York City records 1st death


Associated Press

NEW YORK — A school assistant principal who was sick for several days with swine flu yesterday became the city's first death linked to the virus and the nation's sixth.

Mitchell Wiener, who worked at an intermediate school in Queens, died last night, Flushing Hospital Medical Center spokesman Andrew Rubin said. Wiener, who had been hospitalized and on a ventilator, had been sick with the virus for nearly a week before his school was closed on Thursday. Complications besides the virus likely played a part in his death, Rubin said.

No one else in New York City has become seriously ill from the virus.

The city's first outbreak of swine flu occurred three weeks ago, when about 1,000 students and other people associated with a Catholic high school in Queens began falling ill following the return of several students from Mexico, epicenter of the outbreak. The school was closed.

Five more city schools were to close today, bringing the total to 11, including Wiener's.