Flu outbreak hits local schools

The flu outbreak that has affected thousands of Washington State University students since fall semester began is now hitting Whitman County schools.

Whitman County Public Health officials said the flu hit Colton and St. John last week, and has since spread from there.

“I expect we’re going to see more cases crop up all around,” said Fran Martin, director of the county health department.

Health officials fell short of calling the outbreak the H1N1 virus, or swine flu. They speculated, though, that the WSU outbreak might be H1N1 because it fell outside of the normal flu season.

Martin said the spread of the flu was accelerated, as kids from all over the county gathered at the Palouse Empire Fair over the weekend.

“You had the dance Saturday night, that may have pushed it along,” she said. “With all those kids, the fair is just kind of a breeding ground.”

If the virus did indeed spread at the fair, it showed up in schools early this week.

“It’s pretty much widespread throughout the community,” said Melissa Elkins, registered nurse with the health department. “There isn’t a school in the county that hasn’t been reporting students out with flu symptoms.”

Elkins said an actual count of just how many students are out with what might be the flu is difficult because they do not know which students had symptoms of a simple cold or which had actual flu symptoms.

She did say said five county school districts have reported more than five percent of their students have missed school with symptoms.

For some schools, the percentage is much higher.

St. John/Endicott cooperative high school shut down Monday because of low attendance of both students and staff. The school also cancelled football and volleyball games over the weekend because of the large number of sick athletes.

Supt. Rick Winters said the district will close the middle school at Endicott Friday to give students an extra day to recover.

“We know this isn’t going to make everybody healthy, we’re just trying to give everybody a little more time,” said Winters.

The high school had 23 students absent Tuesday, with another eight out sick from the elementary school.

Winters said the wave of sick students seems to be rising at the Endicott middle school, where sixth, seventh and eighth graders from the two towns go to school. Endicott elementary will still have classes Friday.

Endicott Principal Suzanne Schmick said 24 of the school’s 87 students missed school Tuesday.

The schools will make up the missing days Nov. 3, which had been scheduled for a parent-teacher conference day.

“We’re seeing what we anticipated,” said Elkins. “We don’t know exactly how many are out there. Our count just kind of gives us an idea of how this is going.”

“But you look at Rosalia,” she continued. “They were reporting nothing, then you saw a big surge in the numbers all of a sudden.”

Rosalia Supt. Tom Crowley said the school had a few calls Monday, but the number of absences picked up Tuesday with about 48 students out sick.

He said if the virus hits too many staff members, Rosalia, like St. John and Endicott, would have to close down.

The absentee rate at Colfax schools jumped Monday, with 80 students out at Jennings and 35 out at Colfax High. Jennings has an enrollment of 409 students, kindergarten through eighth grade, and the high school has an enrollment of 239. That puts the absentee rate at 19 percent for the grade school and 14 percent for the high school.

Supt. Michael Morgan said 42 of the 80 absentees at the grade school were reported to have flu-like symptoms.

LaCrosse had 11 of its 107 students out Tuesday. Colton had 13 of 173 absent, and Palouse had 10 of about 200 students call in sick.

Lamont had one student miss school because of illness Tuesday.