In Feb. 2010, the Feltham Hill Nursery and Infant School was closed for three weeks when E. coli O157 was contracted by pupils, affecting 18 people in all.

A report to the Hounslow Council contained 28 recommendations to improve future responses to emergency situations, including:

• the situation should have been declared ‘an emergency’ sooner than it was;
• there were delays in stopping the spread of the outbreak because the school had no emergency plan;
• information sharing between the school and the health authorities was poor;
• confusion over information given to parents resulted in many being worried that the outbreak was not being controlled.

Two children were treated in hospital for the bug, one of which was for a prolonged period of time. The report reveals that the source of the outbreak was never discovered.

The complete report is available at:
http://democraticservices.hounslow.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=53762