Alexander school closed as students, staff fall ill

ALEXANDER – Pupils got two days off from school this week, but it wasn’t much fun.

Union 106 Superintendent May Bouchard said the Alexander Elementary School was closed Thursday and today because 52 of 79 pupils had come down with the flu. And of the school’s eight staff members, four were under the weather, as well.

“It is a cold and a flu,” Bouchard said of the bug that has bitten the Alexander population.

“It’s pretty clear over the last few weeks in areas around Maine that we are seeing an increase in influenza,” said Geoff Beckett, assistant epidemiologist for the state Bureau of Health.

Beckett said he was not aware of any other school in Maine closing because of illness.

“Schools make a decision to close on the basis of having very high absentee rates or having very high numbers of ill staff and when it is not practical to stay open,” he said. “They are not made because there are public health recommendations to close if you have a lot of influenza cases.”

Bouchard, who is a former principal at the Alexander school, said this was the first time the school had to close for health-related issues.

The superintendent said Robbinston Elementary and the Calais Elementary and Calais High School had not experienced similar problems. Likewise, in Baileyville, students remained in school.

At the Woodland Elementary School, Principal Marcelle Marble said they were averaging about 20 absent pupils a day out of a population of 183.

“We are more than normal, but not to the critical level,” Marble said. “We have had strep, there’s a flu bug that’s running around, and then there’s a virus running around. There are three strains that appear to be catching our kids.”

In Princeton, out of a total population of 174 pupils, Principal Nichole Goodspeed said, there were about 10 to 15 pupils out each day. She said they had more youngsters out with the flu before Christmas. “Right now it hasn’t been bad at all,” she said.

Schools in the Union 104 district that includes Eastport have not experienced the same problems as Alexander. Students at the Eastport high and elementary schools were in school Thursday.

In Perry, just a couple of students out of a total of 101 have been out.

At the Pembroke and Charlotte elementary schools it was a regular classroom day.

Beckett said in the past few weeks there have reports of an increase in both influenza A and B cases.

Flu shots still are available, and Beckett said people at high risk should get vaccinated.

“We are mostly concerned that those people who are over age 65, people with chronic upper respiratory or cardiac disease, people with asthma, both children and adults, and people with other chronic diseases who are particularly vulnerable,” he said.