JTA News and Features

Some schools are disinfecting doorknobs, desktops and other surfaces that might once have been overlooked. Others are stocking bathrooms and classrooms with antibacterial soap and hand sanitizer. As summer vacation wanes and students prepare to return to class, Jewish schools throughout the United States are employing rigorous health safety measures to guard against possible outbreaks of swine flu in the fall.

That group includes day schools throughout the Washington area, which are following guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for combating swine flu, known officially as H1N1 virus.

Several local school administrators emphasized, however, that the ramped-up anti-contagion protocols are not a radical departure from their existing health care precautions, and therefore are not cause for alarm.

"We will remain vigilant," explained Renee Salzberg, advancement director at Hebrew Day Institute in Rockville.

"We'll continue to use good hygiene; it's not necessary to beat people over the head with it," added Joshua Levisohn, headmaster of the Melvin J. Berman Hebrew Academy in Rockville.

"We're teaching that hygiene is an important part of growing up; we're not stepping out of the baseline of what we normally do -- we're just being a little more careful," said Rabbi David Serkin of the Hebrew Day School in Silver Spring.

While the spread of swine flu has slowed since it appeared last spring, health officials are concerned about a second major wave of infections once flu season begins.

Of the 45,926 confirmed swine flu cases in the United States this year, 436 have been fatal, according to the World Health Organization. Individuals ages 5 through 24 constitute the largest single cohort of swine flu sufferers, according to the CDC. Schools are of particular concern because they contain many high-risk individuals who spend lots of time in close proximity to each other. Therefore, they can easily spread the disease among themselves and expose their families to it as well.

"We certainly do expect the flu to return in the fall," said Dr. Michael Serlin, chief of infectious diseases at North General Hospital in New York. "H1N1 doesn't seem to be any more virulent than any other flu, but because it hasn't existed until now there's no vaccine and that's why it's spread very fast."

Scientists around the world are racing to develop an effective vaccine in time for flu season.

Meanwhile, concern over the potential spread of the disease has increased at Jewish schools after a number of swine flu cases were reported at Jewish camps across the United States this summer. (California, Maine, Alaska and Puerto Rico have been among the areas most severely affected this summer by swine flu, according to the CDC.)

To guard against a recurrence this fall, the CDC Web site (http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu) is stocked with advice on how to prevent the spread of influenza at schools. For example, the CDC advises schools to take the following steps among others:

¥ Cultivate proper "respiratory etiquette" by encouraging students to cough or sneeze into their crooked elbow.

¥ Promote good hand hygiene by providing easy access to alcohol-based sanitizers or soap and water as well as tissues.

¥ Send sick students and staffers home and advise them to remain home at least 24 hours after they are fever-free (without the use of fever-reducing medicines).

¥ Thoroughly clean surfaces and objects that are likely to have frequent hand contact.

¥ Move students and staffers who become sick in school to a separate room until they can be sent home.

¥ Have masks available for school nurses and others to wear while caring for sick people at school.

Local administrators said they intend to follow updated CDC guidelines that recommend keeping school open if only isolated cases of illness have been reported. Earlier guidelines favored pre-emptive closures, they said.

"The idea is to try to continue functioning as normally as possible under the circumstances," said Jonathan Cannon, head of school at Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School in Rockville.

Within the past year, the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation's Capital in the District hired additional maintenance staff to fight contagion by keeping frequently touched surfaces as clean as possible, according to Sharon Freundel, director of Hebrew and Judaic studies at JPDS.

"We've always been careful about limiting cross-contamination by maintaining best practices at all times," she said.

Likewise, the Yeshiva of Greater Washington in Silver Spring has instructed its maintenance staffers to devote special attention to doorknobs and other surfaces that are constantly being touched. "On the other hand, you can't wipe down every wall," conceded YGW spokesperson Daniel Ely, who said the school is following the CDC recommendations and intends to keep parents briefed on all flu-related developments.

The CDC Web site includes fact sheets and sample letters for informing parents on the flu situation as well as downloadable posters for display in schools that tell students, teachers and staffers how they can prevent the spread of illness.

Serkin said he intends to use the posters in school bathrooms and near hallway sinks. HDS also plans to conduct workshops for students during the first week of school to emphasize the importance of good hygiene and respiratory etiquette. Each student will receive a container of hand sanitizer that can be clipped to a backpack or a belt. The theme of the first week back, Serkin said, will be "A clean start to a new year."

Gil Shefler writes for JTA News and Features; Richard Greenberg is WJW associate editor.