A private school in North Texas closed its campus this week to some of its students following an apparent outbreak of influenza.
Greenhill School located along Spring Valley Road in Addison canceled classes Thursday and Friday for students in seventh through twelfth grade.
The school’s spokesperson Kerry Shea provided the following statement to NBC 5:
"Greenhill School has closed grades 7-12 on Thursday, October 27 and Friday, October 28 due to an excessive number of absences as a result of flu-like illness among students. The decision was made in consultation with Dallas County Health and Human Services in an effort to reduce the possible spread of infection and to allow students who are ill time to rest and recover."
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She said she did not have the number of absences but said the number was "high."
The campus has almost 1,300 students, according to its website. School will be open to all grades on Monday, said Shea.
A spokesperson for DCHHS said several factors are considered by schools facing outbreaks, including situations where teachers are also out sick.
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There is no absentee threshold officials use to determine whether to support a school’s closure.
“Since the school presented several flu-like cases in several students, the determination was made to close the school and that was made directly by the school district and school directly,” said DCHHS spokesperson Christian Grisales.
The county’s latest weekly report of influenza cases shows total confirmed cases remain low in the county, 3.1% for the week ending Oct. 15.
This week, Parkland Hospital’s Chief Medical Officer Doctor Joseph Chang told NBC 5’s Bianca Castro that nearly 20 people were being treated at Parkland for influenza.
“That’s low compared to some of the high years before COVID, but that is actually the largest number since COVID, so we definitely expect this season will be ramping up pretty soon,” said Chang.
With COVID-19 cases slightly increasing with the start of the school year and the number of young patients with the respiratory illness RSV increasing, health leaders say closures like the one at Greenhill could happen anywhere.
“Number one thing is going to be prevention,” said Chang. “Flu. There’s a shot. Go get it.”
HOSPITALS SEEING PATIENT SURGE
Thursday, Cook Children's reported its emergency room and urgent care facilities were overrun with patients testing positive for flu and other respiratory viruses.
“We're seeing numbers that I've never seen before," said Dr. Maxie Brewer.
In the ER, the staff is treating 500 children a day, averaging one child every two minutes.
The pediatric ICU is near capacity with about half of the patients diagnosed with RSV. Others are testing positive for flu and other respiratory illnesses.
"Right now, we're kind of seeing an increase of a few of them, which is causing more havoc, because we're having more patients that get sick that are needing beds, unlike years when we just usually have one virus that's mainly causing the problem," said Brewer.
Also unlike past years, this increase has arrived well ahead of the holiday season with the number of flu cases already equal to those seen at Cook Children's at the end of last November.
"With COVID numbers going down, we stopped using our masks. We really weren't separating as much. And so those viruses, because we were wearing the masks, were really not getting to the children. And now that those masks are gone, that virus is easily spreading," she said.
According to the CDC, Texas is one of four states nationwide already showing a high level of respiratory illness.
