Swine flu tests were being carried out on 23 people across Scotland yesterday as Britain's first confirmed victims of the virus recovered in hospital. Nine people who have been in close contact with newlyweds Iain and Dawn Askham are among those undergoing tests.
Another 14 people with travel links to Mexico or affected parts of the United States have also shown symptoms of swine flu and are being tested, said Scotland's health secretary, Nicola Sturgeon.
The cases came from several health board areas - Greater Glasgow, Lothians, Grampian, Tayside and Lanarkshire. Their symptoms were described as mild.
The Department of Health said last night that leaflets would be distributed to households across the UK containing information on the swine flu virus. A spokeswoman said: "The leaflet will be sent out next week, cover the whole of the UK and will contain information about this flu outbreak and preventative messages."
There were reports last night that the department had ordered millions of surgical face masks for health workers, but the spokeswoman would only say discussions were taking place with manufacturers.
She said: "We are talking to a number of manufacturers about procuring face masks. We are not in a position to provide further details at this stage."
"Although we are aware that facemasks are being given out to the public in Mexico, the available scientific evidence does not support the general wearing of facemasks by those who are not ill while going about their normal activities."
Sturgeon was keen to stress that the symptoms of the people being tested in Scotland were mild and that they were not confirmed cases.
She added that a passenger on the same flight used by the Askhams to fly home from the Mexican resort of Cancún last Tuesday had also shown mild flu symptoms in England, and was also being tested.
Dr Harry Burns, Scotland's chief medical officer, indicated that most of those extra cases involved people aged between 25 and 40, in common with the large majority of the victims in Mexico.
It is understood, however, that one of nine people with symptoms within the Askhams' "contact group" is a five-year-old child and may include colleagues of Dawn Askham at a branch of Boots in Polmont, where she worked as a dispensing assistant but had no direct contact with customers.
In a joint statement issued yesterday afternoon by the couple's parents, Iain and Pauline Askham, and Linda and Brian Colston, the families noted: "They were both quite shocked that the result was positive for swine flu."
Within hours, both families and close friends - 22 people in total - found themselves under surveillance. Both sets of parents are now under voluntary quarantine, taking regular doses of the antiviral drug Tamiflu, waiting for the couple to be discharged from hospital.
Scottish ministers and senior health experts have been at pains to insist their symptoms are very mild and no one else has yet tested positive, but locally the fear of infection has spread faster than the virus.
Calls to NHS24, Scotland's phone-in service for medical advice, have jumped 20% in one day.
The chief medical officer for Wales, Tony Jewell, said there were eight suspected cases under investigation in the country and all were linked to travel in Mexico.
Wiltshire primary care trust confirmed that seven people from the county were being tested at a Health Protection Agency facility in Bristol.
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