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  • U.S. discourages quick school closure for swine flu

    U.S. discourages quick school closure for swine flu
    Fri Aug 7, 2009 9:55am EDT

    By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New U.S. guidelines for the pandemic of H1N1 swine flu released on Friday discourage the early closure of schools, unless the virus becomes worse.

    "We know now that closing schools is not the best option in most cases," Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters in a telephone interview.

    If the virus starts to spread faster when school starts again this month and next, officials should try other means to slow its spread, such as keeping students more widely separated and stressing hand hygiene, the guidelines recommend.

    "The potential benefits of preemptively dismissing students from school are often outweighed by negative consequences, including students being left home alone, health workers missing shifts when they must stay home with their children, students missing meals, and interruption of students' education," the guidelines read.

    Schools for pregnant mothers and disabled children are an exception, as such people are at high risk from flu.

    About 55 million students attend 130,000 public and private schools in the United States, and 7 million staff work there, according to the Department of Education.

    Schools are a breeding ground for infections, but studies have shown that unless they are closed for the entire flu season, closing them only delays an inevitable spread.

    "The decision to dismiss students should be made locally and should balance the goal of reducing the number of people who become seriously ill or die from influenza with the goal of minimizing social disruption," the guidelines read.

    Sick students should be sent home promptly, they stress. Staff should try innovative ways to keep students apart if flu does show up at a school -- for instance, spreading desks apart and keeping classes from mixing.

    NO IMMUNITY

    H1N1 swine flu is unstoppable, according to the World Health Organization, which has also given up on trying to get a precise count of cases.

    "It continues to spread around the world, and it continues to act like it did in the United States in the spring," Frieden said. "It is not changing to become more deadly."

    Experts consider the pandemic to be a moderate one at this point, meaning it can kill people and can put many into the hospital, sometimes for weeks at a time with severe illness. But most people get a mild illness and get better with little or no treatment.

    However, most people appear to have no immunity to the virus, which means that more people are likely to become infected than usually do with a seasonal strain of influenza. That means more sicknesses and deaths just because more people overall will be infected.

    And the strain could change at any moment into a more serious form.

    Vaccine makers have started rolling out their first batches of vaccine but U.S. officials do not expect any public vaccination until mid-October and they do not expect those most at risk from H1N1 -- pregnant women, people with chronic health conditions, children and young adults -- to be fully vaccinated until the first week of December.


  • #2
    Gov't reassures schools on staying open with flu

    Gov't reassures schools on staying open with flu

    By LIBBY QUAID (AP) ? 49 minutes ago

    WASHINGTON ? The federal government is advising schools they don't need to close their doors this fall just because a few students come down with swine flu.

    Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Friday that only schools with high numbers of students getting the new flu should consider closing to stem the outbreak.

    The decision rests with local school officials, but they are looking to the federal government for advice about the new flu strain that has caused a global epidemic.

    As the virus spread to students last spring, more than 700 schools in half the states temporarily closed their doors. The new flu is expected to hit schools again this fall. But the Obama administration is hoping to minimize closings and disruptions they cause for families.

    THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

    WASHINGTON (AP) ? Swine flu is expected to return when kids go back to school, and the government is hoping its new advice on when to shut down schools during an outbreak will prevent the panic and confusion that led to hundreds of school closures last spring.

    The government was to issue new guidance Friday for schools to follow when swine flu strikes. Unlike regular seasonal flu, this virus has not retreated during the hot and humid summer months and so far has infected more than 1 million Americans.

    "We hope no schools have to close, but realistically, some schools will close this fall," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said this week during a forum with administration officials that was broadcast online.

    The decision to close actually rests with local school officials. But those officials are looking to the federal government for advice about the new flu strain that has caused a global epidemic, or pandemic.

    "I'm dealing first and foremost as a parent," Duncan said Friday on a nationally broadcast news show. "I want to keep my children safe and keep them learning." He said officials are asking parents to "use common sense" and encourage their children to vigorously wash their hands several times a day and take other safety precautions.

    "We want to provide as much facts as we can" to local officials, he said. "Basically, this will be a tiered response. If there's a handful of children at a school who might be sick, we want the parents to keep them home. If the numbers escalate dramatically, then we might have to close the schools."

    Duncan said officials anticipate the vaccine will be available by mid-October and that they want schools to be principal sites for getting the shots.

    The administration wants to avoid the chaos of last spring, when more than 700 schools in half the states closed their doors. There are about 132,000 public and private schools in the U.S.

    Students got an unexpected vacation, but many parents wound up scrambling to find child care.

    School officials had been acting on advice from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which at first said schools should shut down for about two weeks if there were suspected cases of swine flu.

    Then the CDC changed course, saying schools did not need to close because the virus was milder than feared. Instead, parents were told to keep sick kids home for at least a week.

    Duncan said at a swine flu summit last month that closing school should be "a last resort, not a first resort."

    He said earlier this week that school districts should use common sense. "If you have one child sick, that's one thing. If you have a whole host of children getting sick, that's another," Duncan said.

    While this particular flu virus is new, the matter of school closings is not. Every winter, regular flu outbreaks prompt a relatively small number of schools to close for a few days because of high absenteeism among students or staff.

    In addition to new guidance for when to close, the CDC and Education Department said this week they have set up a new monitoring system to track school closures across the country.

    Still up in the air is whether schools will be turned into vaccine clinics, though Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has said that seems logical. "We're seeing schools as potential partners," she said at the forum with Duncan.

    Children are on the priority list for the first doses of swine flu vaccine, but because of time needed for testing and manufacturing, inoculations can't begin until school has been in session for more than a month; the government is aiming for Oct. 15. Many questions remain, including whether people will need one shot or two for protection. That is in addition to the regular winter flu vaccine that is also recommended for children.

    States and school districts should be preparing for the possibility of mass vaccinations, federal officials have said.

    They also should make plans to keep kids learning when schools do close, Duncan said.

    Duncan was interviewed Friday on CBS's "The Early Show."

    AP Medical Writer Lauran Neergaard contributed to this report.

    Copyright ? 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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