Public school pupils heading home to the Far East for the Easter holidays have been warned they may be placed in quarantine and have to undergo medical checks before they will be allowed back into the classroom.

Woodhouse Grove school at Apperley Bridge fears pupils could be at risk from the deadly Sars virus, which so far has claimed 100 lives worldwide and infected 2,600 in 18 countries.

And Fulneck School at Pudsey has warned its Far East-based pupils not to head home for the Easter holidays - or face being kept out of the classroom until the all-clear is given.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome is believed to come from Hong Kong and the Guangdong province of China, and Britons are warned not to travel to either area.

Woodhouse Grove has told the parents of those children going home for the two-week break that their youngsters will have to undergo medical checks on their return and get the all-clear before they can re-join their classmates.

A school spokesman said: "The parents of those returning to Hong Kong have been advised that the school reserves the right not to permit them back to school unless or until satisfactory health checks have been made. The school will make quarantine arrangements for anyone who has not been checked or for whom we have any anxieties."

A spokesman from Fulneck School said: "We advised our boarders from Hong Kong not to go back for the holidays and the majority took that advice.

"We took our own advice from health organisations and told those pupils that if they did go home they could not come back to school until they had been in England for two weeks, which would give time for any Sars symptoms to show."

Bradford College has sent out letters to all its Far East students making them aware of the Sars situation and guiding them to the World Health Organisation's (WHO) website for more information.

A College spokesman said: "We don't want to be scaremongering but we've consulted the World Health Organisation and our own doctor for advice which we've passed on to our students in a letter. The word we're getting from students is that their families are advising them to stay here and not go home. They are being very responsible about it and are making their own alternative arrangements for the holidays."

Students at Bradford University are also being advised to re-think their travel plans if they were thinking of flying to an infected destination.

Dean of Students Adrian Pearce said: "There's no cause for alarm or distress at the moment but we are sticking to guidelines from the Department of Health urging anyone thinking of going to a Sars infected country to reconsider their travel plans."

Over the weekend the WHO reported 63 new cases of Sars. The UK Government has issued an alert to all GPs, NHS Trusts and public health workers.