Officials at St. Norbert, UWGB try to slow spread of flu virus

By Kelly McBride
kmcbride@greenbaypressgazette.com

College officials are telling sick students to go home to avoid spreading illness in the close quarters of a campus community.

About 100 St. Norbert College students have returned home sick this semester, mostly with flu-like symptoms, said Barbara Bloomer, director of health and wellness services. The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay doesn't have exact figures, but officials there have been telling ill students to head home as well.

"If anybody does have the classic signs of a temperature greater than 100 plus a cough, or a temperature greater than 100 plus a sore throat, we're really promoting for them to go home-home and leave the campus situation," said Amy Henniges, director of the counseling and health center at UWGB.

The average St. Norbert student who goes home ill is gone for about four days, Bloomer said. That means several days of missed class, but officials have been flexible in helping recovering students.

"Our faculty have been very, very good about assisting students and accommodating them and helping them get caught back up," Bloomer said. "I think we've established the protocol early on, that students — we would help them to get home so they could have the care they needed at home."

St. Norbert already has experienced a couple cycles of peaks and valleys related to flu-like illness, Bloomer said. During a peak, about 10 to 15 students might be home at any one time.

Both schools are out of seasonal flu vaccine and waiting for the swine flu vaccines to arrive. UWGB has ordered about 300 doses of swine flu vaccine, while St. Norbert is waiting for the OK from the state to place its order.

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services says four more people in the state have died from the swine flu.

There was one in Eau Claire County, two in Milwaukee County and one in Oconto County.

That brings the death total to five since Sept. 1 and 14 altogether including those in the spring.

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— The Associated Press