Schools Urged to Prepare to Teach Through Swine Flu Absenteeism
It doesn't sound like the U.S. government wants schools to close this year no matter how many students are sick with swine flu. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan says schools will need to be ready to keep on teaching even if a large number of students are sick with H1N1 swine flu. Kathleen Sebelius described some "mitigation strategies" at a visit to a local Washington D.C. school. Handwashing and coughing into your sleeve are helpful but they can only do so much. Some would also call closing the school for a few days a good mitigation strategy but it isn't one the government seems willing to use. Plus, what if there is something else spreading around the school? Schools will do much more harm than good if they stay open and the bug is a norovirus instead of the H1N1 virus.
These "mitigation strategies" as Sebelius calls them are certainly not going to stop the virus. We need a vaccine to help us fight this invisible threat and that is still months away. The HHS has already said that even the high priority groups will not be fully immunized until Thanksgiving. With schools remaining open no matter how many kids are sick then we can probably all be assured most of us will be exposed to the swine flu virus well before the vaccine is ready.
It doesn't sound like the U.S. government wants schools to close this year no matter how many students are sick with swine flu. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan says schools will need to be ready to 
