News and information for staff members and the Madison community
Vol. II No. 5 - February 27, 2007
Planning for a pandemic is no simple task. Not knowing exactly what type of potential crisis you are planning for makes the job difficult. But the MMSD goal is to ensure, as best as possible, that delivering educational services continue for as long as practical.
First, let's define a few terms. An epidemic is the occurrence of more cases of a disease than would be expected in a community or region during a given time period. Examples are the mumps outbreak in the Midwest in the spring of 2006 and the pertussis (whooping cough) outbreak in Wisconsin in 2005.
A pandemic is a widespread epidemic — it can affect a whole region, a continent, or the world. Pandemics can be caused by any disease but currently when you hear pandemic, it most likely refers to an influenza pandemic. Seasonal flu....Bird flu....
Influenza pandemics are caused by new strains of the influenza virus. The virus spreads quickly from person to person, most often through respiratory droplets caused by coughing or sneezing. It can also be spread by touching an object with the virus on it and then touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Because no one has any immunity to the new strain, many more people become ill and die during pandemics as compared to seasonal flu.
Pandemics occur, on average, about three times every century. It is difficult to predict when the next pandemic will occur or how severe it will be.
When a pandemic occurs, as many as 4 in 10 school children will be sick; many teachers and staff members will also be ill or need to care for ill family members and not be able to come to work. Schools may need to be closed for a month or several months. An influenza pandemic will disrupt normal daily living--it may interrupt basic services such as transportation, food delivery and will likely cause business closings.
Influenza pandemics are not limited to winter months or a certain season; they can last up to a couple years with recurring outbreaks each lasting 6-8 weeks. Because the virus is a completely new strain, a vaccine is not available at first and can take up to 6 months to be produced.
One of the best ways to protect yourself and your family is to get an annual flu shot. Additionally, some simple measures are helpful to prevent and decrease the spread of influenza — careful hand washing, covering your mouth when sneezing, and staying home when ill. The CDC website www.pandemicflu.gov provides extensive information in both English and Spanish about seasonal, pandemic and bird flu.
MMSD has a Pandemic Planning Team that has been meeting since early spring of 2006 to develop the district's pandemic response plan. The goals of our plan are to:
Last Updated: Mon Apr 2 14:44:12 2007
Comments: comments@madison.k12.wi.us
Web Publisher: Chris Burch, cburch@madison.k12.wi.us
Technical Issues: webmaster@madison.k12.wi.us