Fort Worth ISD Out for Swine Flu

[Scooter24]

Source: Local News

Several local schools -- including the entire Fort Worth Independent School District -- have closed in a precautionary effort against swine flu. The Fort Worth ISD is closing all of its campuses beginning Thursday until May 11.

Three of the state's 16 confirmed cases are in Dallas County. The director of Dallas County's health department said Wednesday that swine flu precautions are "not overkill."

One case involves a student at Canyon Creek Elementary School in Richardson. The school will be closed through the end of the week.

Other schools in Dallas, Cleburne and Lewisville announced closures this week because of probable cases of swine flu.

Read more: http://www.nbcdfw.com/health/topics/More-N-Texas-School-Close-Due-to-Swine-Flu.html

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This closure affects more than 80,000 students and over 140 schools.

[madrchsod]

1. 80,000 students with nothing to do but hang out with their friends

parents who won`t be able to find baby sitters and won`t be able to take time off.

looks like this is going to be the standard operating procedure across this country in in the month of may...shut the country down.

[Dinger]

9. I KNOW This Isn't What You Meant, But

teachers aren't babysitters. Just sayin'.:)

[Baby Snooks]

2. Better to be paranoid than dead...

If we had been a little more paranoid in 1917, 1918 might not have happened. It's a good time to heed the advice given to stalking victims - better to be paranoid than dead.

A lot of people are making a joke of all of this - it really is nothing to joke about. This is a virus that no one has ever seen before that is a recombinant virus of human, avian and swine strains. No one knows what it is capable of today or what it may be capable of tomorrow. All anyone knows is what it was capable of yesterday.

They assumed the danger was to healthy adults which is the population hit hardest in Mexico. And then a 23 month old child from Mexico died in Houston. And so the virus is now in Houston. The doctors and nurses of course take precautions. But they touch a pen or a clipboard. Then someone else touches the pen or a clipboard. And it's like the one passenger on the one plane. All it takes is one. Who passes it to another. And they in turn pass it to another. And that is how a pandemic begins. Just takes one. Which becomes two. Which becomes four. Which becomes eight. And soon there are hundreds.

In reality in our society only limited containment is possible but it is still the wisest and really the only course of action we can take.

[willing dwarf]

3. That's the trouble...

If this Swine flu dies off and disappears, no one will know how big a crisis we averted. It' s hard to see th e positive hand of action in the successful effort to stave off a crisis.

[Baby Snooks]

5. This is a crisis...

This won't just go away. It is a strain now that may combine with other strains. Or just mutate. I believe the Spanish Flu as it was called struck in three separate pandemics beginning in 1917. The first one apparently wasn't very serious and had a low mortality rate. The last one, in 1918, killed an estimated 50 million people. No one knows for sure but they suspect it was an avian flu that mutated from a very mild strain to a deadly strain. Keep in mind last year's flu shot didn't work because the strain of flu they expected mutated.

There apparently is a lot we don't know and there is even debate as to whether this is a swine strain or an avian strain that infected swine first and then mutated or merely combined with a swine strain. Actually two swine strains. It is a mystery. And mysteries in medicine are also usually very dangerous to make assumptions about.

The avian strain that we have all worried about is still there. Mutating. It didn't just go away.

[thevoiceofreason]

4. At least my daughters can come down to Houston and hang with me now!

[Texas Mom]

6. um maybe not. Swine Flu Confirmed in Episcopal

High School student today. They are closed until Monday at least. Fasten your seat belts.

[Baby Snooks]

10. And two HISD schools...

http://blogs.chron.com/schoolzone/2009/04/hisd_closings_in_swine_flu_out.html

It's really odd how it's only one child here, one child there.

[pitchforksandtorches]

7. WTF? I thought Texas left the country

[MrsBrady]

8. so now what...

i think if they need to close the schools, they should...

but are you going to be able to keep all these kids from going to the park, the mall, riding their bikes, driving their cars, playing with friends, going on dates,
roaming the neighborhoods...etc?

and are parents going to be able to handle their kids being out of school so early?...child care, teen-care, etc...

So you've closed the school...now what?