Well, here we go. The schools are starting to close because of the flu - 24 in one district, one in the county that I live in, and tons of the Catholic schools. Our son’s school was busily disinfecting all weekend. Another district is completely closed until May 13th.
I work at a university, so it will be interesting to see how this all plays out. Is anyone experiencing this yet? What will you do with your kids? Luckily our son is 14, so we don’t need child care or anything like that. Besides, if our district closes it’s likely that I’ll be home also.
I’m sure my nephew is happy - he has three days off next week. So now they’ll all be at the mall, movie theatre, park, or fast food restaurants instead, hanging out in groups.
If my university ends up closing over this, I will be so mad. Not only am I skeptical that the aporkacalypse is much to worry about, but I’m about a month from graduating and I don’t want anything in the way. Plus I need to bring the grade of one of my classes up.
Nothing to do with school, but today, I flew into an airport I’ve been through many times, and I’m staying at a hotel I’ve stayed at before, and each has “hand sanitizing stations” where they never were before. I suppose it makes some people feel safer.
Still, the guy wearing a surgical mask who was waiting at the airport baggage claim carousel attracted a few quiet giggles from others who were also waiting.
Yeah in Chicago they have closed some schools and it’s so dumb. The Chicago Public Library has set up a “program” for kids who have parents that work, so they can read and use computers at the library. The park district set up a program so the kids can play.
Now maybe I’m just dumb but isn’t the idea of closing the schools to keep the kids AWAY from each other?
The high school behind where I live (Maryland) closed on Friday…supposed to be closed for 2 weeks. Over-reacting a bit! But, it does make it a little quieter around here.
They just closed my daughter’s school for a week. A kid there had the swine flu like 2 weeks ago.
My son goes to a different school, and boy is he pissed!
We’ve had one confirmed case in my county and it was a school kid. They closed his elementary school for two weeks but only that school so far. (Lee Co. FLA)
To be fair, a kid with the flu is not likely to attend a park day. Unlike regular school, where there are penalties if you don’t attend, which typically make people send their kids even if the kids are feeling a little under the weather, it’s not as big a deal for those parents to let their kids skip a park day or day at the library.
We homeschool, so this typically wouldn’t be a problem for us, but we attend a co-op once a week. Last week one of the families didn’t attend because their kids had flu-like symptoms. Over the weekend they were both diagnosed with swine flu. Not confirmed by the CDC as far as I know, but diagnosed by their doctors. Glad they kept them home instead of coming to co-op. We stayed home when one of ours was complaining of a sore throat and aches. I worked from home too. She never developed any other symptoms and was feeling fine at the end of the day, so we may have dodged a bullet.
I don’t have kids so I have no idea what the schools here are doing, but I have one coworker who has gone nutty over the swine flu. Every time someone here coughs or sneezes she sprays lysol into the air in hopes of killing germs on their way to her cube. The constant spray is making me cough and sneeze a lot more than normal because it is irritating the shit out of my nose and lungs, which causes here to spray more lysol. I mentioned to her that it is irritating my throat and to please knock it off but I don’t know if she will calm down enough to stop.
I went to my school’s graduation ceremony on Saturday and in deference to the fear of flu, it was decided that the dean would give everyone a daffodil instead of shaking the graduates’ hands.
With the overacting paranoia going around now, I wonder what will happen if the virus mutates into something substantial during the second wave and people should have a real concern for their health?
They should appreciate having to make up class time in June or July.
I feel bad for a lady that had to go into the nursing home about a month ago. She’s dieing and they closed the nursing home last week. Now the people that were visiting can’t. She’ll probably die without any friends being around.
Yes, it is dumb, because it’s just a flu like any other. The mortality rate of “swine” flu is the same as any other flu. But because it has a special name, people are acting like idiots.
Geez, my son’s school hasn’t even instituted a handwashing policy. I asked my son if they were being more strict about the kids washing their hands, especially before they eat and after recess. Nope. Same policy as always - they’re reminded to wash up after using the bathroom, but not any other time (he’s in kindergarten). I told him to go ahead and take the initiative, but he’s five, so who knows if that will happen. Our family is in the habit of washing every time we come home from somewhere, so he gets a good scrub after school, but you would think the schools would start being more mindful of something so simple.
uggh, that would cause me to sneeze a lot more, and maybe even trigger mild asthma! If you have a corporate health-and-safety office, contact them and see if they can get her to stop; her excessive use of chemicals in the workplace is a risk to your health (though normal use has pretty low risk, eye and respiratory irritation are common effects of these types of chemicals).
Normally I’d be happy about not going to school, but I sure hope they don’t close my college down. No matter how much I dislike it, I need to be in school. If I’m not I don’t get my money, and I need that to like, eat and stuff.
One of our elementary schools has been closed since Wednesday because they had one (as yet) unconfirmed but possible case. A few other kid were tested and came up negative. Luckily, that’s the only school that’s been affected.
