Swine Flue: Katy ISD

[Cajungaltx]

Just received:

"Highly Probable" case of H1N1 found at Beckendorff Junior High in Katy ISD
(May 1, 2009) - Katy ISD received notification today from the Fort Bend County Department of Health & Human Services (FBCHHS) of a "highly probable" case of the H1N1 (swine flu) virus at Beckendorff Junior High. The FBCHHS, which serves as the lead authority in determining whether or not a school should be closed and for how long, has determined that Beckendorff will be closed for all of next week and will reopen on May 11. Should there be any changes we will notify parents through School Messenger, our district Web site (www.katyisd.org) and eNews for those who have subscribed.

The campus has been in contact with the student's family and the student is no longer exhibiting symptoms, has responded to treatment and has been cleared by a physician to return to school on May 4.
At this time there have been no additional confirmed or highly probable cases among students or staff at Beckendorff for the past seven days.

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Joy Joy!

Hope you don't have a kid in Beckendorff....

[toverman]

At least they're just closing the school and not the entire district like Fort Worth ISD did (as you've probably heard ... 80,000 students).

[dliveleyphotography]

I live about 200 yards from that school, good thing I am out of state at the moment :)

[bands321]

The really stupid thing is the girl has been out of school for a week, she is fine and cleared to go back to school on the 4th...but she can't because it will be closed. Take the weekend, clean the school and get on with it....

The media is making way more out of this than they need to. Do we close schools when someone gets the regular flu? This thing (swine flu) has been around since the 30's...get over it already....sheesh

There was a report on the local news that stated that exact thing and said more people die every year from the regular flu, why is this one getting all the attention?

[toverman]

The length of time some of the schools/school districts are closing is to exceed the basic incubation period. The hope is that without the kids coughing and sneezing on each other, if there are any infected kids the flu will have run its course.

I don't want that to sound like I'm defending them, though. Sanitizing any public building is at best a PR move because none of it would matter if an infected person entered and sneezed on a doorknob touched by many others. Kind of like the crypto outbreak we had last summer in DFW ... sanitizing the public swimming pools lasts only as long as another infected person doesn't sully the water.

This is a flu; the extra alarm has come from it being a "novel flu" to which none or few people seem immune to. The heightened awareness means people who suspect they may have it are more likely to receive treatment. I don't expect this stuff to last much longer; we're at the end of the regular flu season, too.

[Tom]

I really wish I had a pet pot bellied pig to walk around on a leash right now.

All of this is beyond ridiculous.

[Joe_Lorenzini]

LISD (Lewisville Independent School District) up here in the Flower Mound, Lewsivlle area (north of DFW) is shut down for a week (50,000 students). All athletic activities have also been canceled until May 8th.

We have 3 confirmed cases and a dozen more under investigation. They refuse to release any further information (as of today).

We went bowling as a family last night and were the only ones in the entire alley. Afterwords we went out to dinner and there was one other family besides us. Go figure.

I imagine there's quite a few angry, frustrated parents up here scrambling to find child care for their kids. Care centers are not taking kids for the week as they've been advised not to.

It is what it is. Not a whole lot we can do about it except get ourselves educated and make intelligent decisions (on what we "can" control).

Joe

[DeannaD]

Unless things have changed the word was that the virus dies in 48 hours without a human host, therefore no reason to disinfect the schools more than normal. Has anyone heard differently?

Life in Sugar Land seems very normal. I had to park 1/2 mile from the soccer fields for my son's game. I wish some of those people had stayed home :-).

Proms & graduations coming up soon. This thing needs to go away! At least the hype seems to be calming... that's a good thing.

[gbelltx]

Both my kids go to the School in Cibolo where this thing started in Texas. They are at each other from being in the house for so long. Just found out they will be out of scholl another week. The other highschool in the district has prom on 5/9 but no school until 5/11. We will al be in trouble if this thing comes back in a few months even stronger.

[toverman]

Originally Posted by gbelltx

The other highschool in the district has prom on 5/9 but no school until 5/11.

You'd think prom would be even worse than regular school ... close dancing, groups eating at tables, sometimes a buffet. And in some cases, the flu is the lesser evil one could catch if not behaving oneself at prom!