H1N1 confirmed at Lee High

Two students at Robert E. Lee High School in Staunton have contracted the H1N1 virus, or swine flu, Superintendent Steven Nichols said Thursday.

Nichols said he learned of the cases around noon and within the hour had posted a letter to the Lee High School Web site informing the school community of the situation. There are no plans to close schools, he said.

The school division, on at least a weekly basis, has been in contact with local and state health officials about the swine flu and is stepping up efforts to make sure students are practicing safe hygiene.

“We are taking this situation seriously, but I must remind everyone we are not in a panic mode, merely being responsive,” Nichols said in the letter.

The school division, he said, has “stepped up” efforts to make sure students are practicing safe hygiene, including sneezing into a sleeve, using hand sanitizers, which have been placed in all schools, and avoiding contact with the mouth or eyes.

The school division is using disinfecting agents and is following the guidance of health officials.

“I feel that we’re doing all that can be expected by a group of people – you know, we have so many people in a confined space,” Nichols said. “I feel that we’re taking steps necessary to do everything we can to keep things safe.”

Health officials have noted that schools, churches and indoor sporting events are the easiest places to spread the H1N1 virus.

Nichols said the school division additionally will be following the advice of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

“The school division will continue its very close contact with local and state officials,” Nichols wrote, “and will take advice and direction in insuring the safest environment for everyone as possible.”

According to a new CDC report, one in 13 U.S. H1N1 virus deaths have been among children, with most of them being school age.

Through Aug. 8, there were 477 total swine flu deaths, including 36 children.

“There’s a lot of school-aged children” in the death count, said Dr. Beth Bell, a CDC epidemiologist who is a leader in the agency’s swine flu response efforts.
It’s not clear why such a large percentage of the swine flu pediatric deaths are in kids 5 or older. It simply may be because older children were more likely to encounter the virus – at schools or summer camps, for example – than very young children who spend more time at home, Bell said.

Two-thirds of the children who have died of swine flu had high-risk medical conditions, nearly all of them related to the nervous system, including mental retardation, cerebral palsy and epilepsy and other seizure disorders.

The swine flu is also having an effect on college campuses nationwide.

The University of Virginia’s Elson Student Health Center since Aug 22 has seen 27 cases of flu, which it has presumed to be swine flu.

The University of Virginia Health System’s Beirnie B. Carter Center for Immunology Research, through an $8.2 million grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, is studying how the human immune system works to clear viruses from the body.

“With the swine flu, as with the avian flu, the body responds to a viral infection by sending cells to the site of the infection to kill the invading cells,” Dr. Thomas Braciale, director of the Carter Center and a professor of pathology and microbiology at the U.Va. School of Medicine, said in a release. “However, these viruses may have the ability to manipulate a person’s own immune system, which in turn causes the body to inflict more harm on itself.”

A vaccine for the swine flu is expected to be ready by October.

“We just want people not to panic,” Nichols said. “We’ll get through this.”

The Associated Press contributed to this story.