Public school officials near the U.S.-Mexico border in Cochise County say they are prepared in case there is a confirmed case of swine flu in a school.

On Monday, public schools in Nogales closed for one week as a precaution after a student tested positive for swine flu.

Meanwhile, the first confirmed case of swine flu in Sonora, Mexico, was announced Monday by Raymundo Lopez Vucovich, the state’s secretary of public health. The 15-year-old is a resident of Nuevo Hermosillo, El Imparcial newspaper reported.

But, Mexico, the epicenter of the swine flu outbreak, is now returning to normalcy. Officials are lifting a five-day shutdown imposed on public and private activities on Friday.

Schools in Naco, Sonora, and the rest of Mexico have been closed since April 27. El Imparcial also reported that Mexico’s president and governors have decided that basic education will remain closed until May 11, while higher education will stay shut until Thursday.

Some students in the Bisbee Unified School District have family on both sides of the border. As a result, officials decided to post an alert on the district’s Web site stating the following:

“The Center for Disease Control has advised people not to travel to Mexico because of the swine flu outbreak. The BUSD School District is asking our students and families to follow this important advisory and not to travel to Mexico while this advisory is in place.”

Bisbee Unified School District Superintendent Gail Covington said a plan is in place in the event that there is a need to close.

“We have communications ready to go out. We have everyone assigned to jobs and what they are to do in that communication process,” she said.

She pointed out the latest guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that if a school dismisses students, the schools should close “for up to 14 days depending on the extent and severity of the illness and in close consultation with local and state public health officials.”

“This length of time is recommended because children are likely to be infectious for about seven to 10 days after the onset of illness,” states the CDC Web site.

Covington said teachers are putting together packets containing a couple weeks of work. She said teachers would be able to communicate with students via phone and perhaps e-mail or the Internet.

“In the event that we have a case of swine flu in the Bisbee Unified School District and our board decides that we will close a school or schools, we are ready,” she said.

Douglas Unified School District Superintendent Earl Pettit said officials would take direction from the CDC and Arizona Department of Education, as well as the county health department.

“If we were to have confirmed case within our schools, with a staff member or a student, we would execute the same plan that they did at Nogales. We would close the district,” he said.

He explained that Tom Horne, the state’s superintendent of public instruction, sent a letter to districts advising if there is a case of swine flu in a school, then that school should be closed. But, Pettit added, schools in Douglas would actually close all buildings due to the nature of that community.

“If we are going to do one, we are going to do them all — to the point that it would be the same thing for the charter and private schools in Douglas,” he said. “If they have one in the private school, we will close our district and vice versa.”

Pettit said in this particular case the protocol calls for closing the schools at the end of the day, instead of conducting an emergency evacuation.

“We have discovered it is probably more dangerous to do an evacuation than the chances of a continued transmission if they are already there,” he added.

Naco, Ariz., School Superintendent Pat Marsh said closure is not planned at this time, but added, “We are on alert and aware of what to look for.”

“We are having the same kind of general headaches and stomachaches. We don’t have anything unusual at the school at all,” she said. “If children seem to be running a fever, we send them home immediately.”

She said officials would follow the instructions listed in the letter that Horne’s office sent to every school district in the state.