Swine flu precautions eased for schools
Schools no longer need to close if they have students diagnosed with swine flu, state and national health specialists advised yesterday. That reversal of last week's policy was prompted by a growing understanding that the disease is milder than expected, officials said.
"It is safe to send your child to school," said Dr. Lauren Smith, medical director of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. "The severity of the illness we have seen thus far has not been as bad as we had originally feared."
The state sent updated recommendations to schools and day care centers yesterday based on guidance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Closing a school would be warranted only if large numbers of students or staff were ill, the CDC advised.
School and health officials in Lexington, Newton, and Norfolk were among those sending messages home reporting cases of swine flu, or H1N1, while explaining that they would not be closing, based on the new recommendations. In Lexington, three high school students who traveled to Costa Rica during April vacation who had probable cases have recovered. In Newton, one student was diagnosed as having a probable case and one case was confirmed in Norfolk.
"As we understand this outbreak more and more, we are finding that it's behaving like a mild seasonal flu, and we certainly would not close school for a case of mild seasonal flu," said J. David Naparstek, commissioner of health and human services in Newton.
John D. Donahue of Lexington, who has a daughter in high school and a son in middle school, thinks the state and national guidelines got it right.
"One part of me has been having the over-the-top paranoia any parent would have, but I think the more rational part has been following the news and looking at what the experts have been saying about the trajectory of the disease as it develops," he said. "If I had heard of a confirmed case in Lexington 10 days ago, I would have felt like keeping the kids home. What we knew was it was a previously unknown hybrid and people had died in Mexico. Now we know a lot more, and virtually all the news in the past 10 days has been more or less reassuring."
Health officials say that most cases of swine flu have been similar in severity to seasonal flu cases. When the new strain of influenza first surfaced in Mexico, disease trackers worried that it might prove more deadly because people would not have immunity and because early reports indicated a high death toll.
Most people in the United States with confirmed cases of H1N1 have been only mildly ill, and few required hospitalization.
Two people have died from the virus in the United States, with the most recent victim, a Texas woman with chronic health conditions, announced yesterday. That followed the death last month of a 22-month-old from Mexico who was hospitalized in Houston.
Confirmed cases in the country now number 403. Among the 34 cases in Massachusetts, three people were admitted to hospitals and all have recovered.
The state is now urging schools to spread the word on prevention, focusing on hand-washing, cough etiquette, and keeping children home if they have a fever, runny nose, sore throat, or cough.
"We hope it just runs its course, as it does each and every year," Naparstek of Newton said.
Elizabeth Cooney can be reached at lizcooney@gmail.com 
