AN EMERGENCY meeting is to be held at South Kent College in Folkestone after two students died from meningitis at the weekend.

It is hoped the meeting, due to be held tomorrow (Tuesday) at 4pm, will be able to reassure parents and students about the risks of the infection and to inform them on signs of the disease to look out for.

Representatives from the East Kent Health Authority are expected to be on hand to give advice. Over the weekend a Folkestone student was admitted to hospital with meningoccocal septicaemia, the most dangerous strain of the disease. She later died there.

Another student, believed to be from the Ashford campus, was also found to have a meningoccocal infection and also died. The college has said that as far as it knows the students had not been in contact with each other. It also said that it is not unusual to have two cases of meningitis at this time of year.

All close contacts have been given preventative antibiotics. Meningitis germs live in the back of the nose and throat of 10 per cent of the population. Many people are carriers, without ever knowing.