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Area school districts seek to calm parents while issuing personal hygiene reminders, By Nancy Kriz
Area school districts are calmly issuing reminders about swine flu and personal hygiene as the first U.S. death related to the flu occurred and as the World Health Organization (WHO) raised the pandemic level to phase 5 on Wednesday.
The phase 5 level indicates widespread human-to-human transmission into at least two countries in one WHO region. National media outlets reported on Wednesday that a phase 5 “is a strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time to finalize the organization, communication, and implementation of the planned mitigation measures is short.”
Phase 6 is the highest in the scale and is for a full-scale pandemic.
In Goshen, a nursing home employee recovering from Type A influenza was being tested for swine flu, county and state officials said. Residents at the Valley View Center for Nursing Care and Rehabilitation will be treated with anti-viral drug Tamiflu as a precaution, and all employees will be offered the prescription as a precaution, according to Orange County spokesperson Richard Mayfield.
As of Wednesday, most the area’s school districts had posted letters on their Web sites and supplemented that by sending the same material home with students. In New York City, the private St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens had 28 confirmed cases of swine flu, with possibly 17 more as of late in the day on Wednesday.
New York State leads the nation in cases with 45 as of Wednesday, according to the Associated Press, with more than 150 cases found in Mexico, where the flu was first isolated.
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Chester
At the Chester School District, Ro Joyce, secretary to School Superintendent Helen Ann Livingston, said the district is taking all the necessary precautions it needs to, just like it did during the MRSA outbreak which took place almost two years ago.
“We do everything we can to keep the kids safe,” said Joyce. “There’s sanitizers every place you can think of.”
The district also sent a letter home Wednesday, which is also posted on its Web site.
Warwick
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At the Warwick School District, School Superintendent Dr. Frank Greenhall echoed Livingston’s comments. “Flu spreads easily,” wrote Greenhall in his letter posted on the district’s Web site. “It is also important to teach your children how to reduce their risk of getting the flu and protect others from infection.”
Florida
At the Florida School District, School Superintendent Douglas Burnside said a letter would be posted on his district’s Web site.
“We’re taking a proactive approach,” he said. “We also want to remind parents about the need for good hygiene.”
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Greenwood Lake
Harold Hilburgh, the interim superintendent for the Greenwood Lake School District, said the district is already asking its cleaning staff “to do double effort in disinfecting during school and after hours” in addition to notifying parents via the district’s Web site.
“All our folks spend careful time making sure they’ve wiped everything down,” added Hilburgh. “We’re taking a reasonable and prudent approach and we’re watching what happened. Our people are really on top of this.”
Get the swine flu facts
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• Online: www.cdc.gov/swineflu
• Call: The Orange County Department of Health hotline: 291-4300; or the New York State Department of Health help line: 800-808-1987.
Swine flu precautions
Sent from the West Point Emergency Operations Center on behalf of the Commander, Keller Army Community Hospital:
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No one can predict which flu outbreak will become a pandemic, but the real first line of defense is you and what should be everyday personal hygiene practices:
Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hands cleaners are also effective-keep one of these bottles in your office and use it regularly.
Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it. If you don’t have a tissue, cough/sneeze into your sleeve. That way the germs aren’t on your hand.
Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread that way.
In the gym, wipe down equipment with disinfectant/sanitizer before and after use.
Finally, don’t shake hands.
Now, some specific measures to take if you become sick:
Limit contact with others to keep from infecting them. And if you are well, try to avoid close contact with sick people. This strain of influenza appears to spread through person-to-person contact. Coughing, sneezing, and touching are the primary ways transmission occurs.
If you have cold symptoms, stay home from work or school.
Contact your health care professional if you
have a fever higher than 100.4 Fahrenheit
have difficulty breathing
have pain with breathing
and/or have trouble staying hydrated (haven’t urinated in more than eight hours, or get light headed when you stand up)
If your illness sounds like flu, feels like flus, stay home for at least seven days after the onset of your sickness or 48 hours after the symptoms resolve themselves, whichever is longer.
For up-to-date information, visit the Center for Disease Control’s Web site at www.cdc.gov.
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