Mar. 8--BRISTOL, Va. -- Though encouraged by the low number of current H1N1 flu cases across the region, area medical officials warn that it remains an unpredictable illness and they are urging residents to get the vaccine.
"While we're cautiously optimistic about what we're seeing, we really have to remain on our guard," John Dreyzehner, director of the Cumberland Plateau Health District in Southwest Virginia, said Thursday. "There's no rule that says H1N1 can't come around again in the months ahead."
Dreyzehner said the region is seeing low levels of H1N1 flu symptoms. "We haven't had anything like the huge number of cases we saw last fall," he said.
Stephen May, medical director of the Sullivan County Regional Health District in Blountville, Tenn., shared Dreyzehner's guarded hopefulness about the H1N1 flu virus, which is a particular threat for children and young adults, pregnant women, health-care workers and people with weakened immune systems.
"H1N1 continues to circulate in our region, but the cases are much lower," May said. "So that's actually great news. But H1N1 is still an issue, it's still here and we still need people to help fight it by getting the H1N1 vaccine."
Neither Dreyzehner nor May could provide official numbers on current cases of H1N1 in this area. But the Virginia Department of Health reports that less than 2 percent of all emergency-room and urgent-care visits in Southwest Virginia in February were for flu-like illnesses.
That's a dramatic decrease from 14 percent in October 2009, when H1N1 was taking its heaviest toll on the region, leading to absentee rates as high as 30 percent in some schools and causing thousands to become ill with the flu virus.
May noted that during September and October, Sullivan County was seeing "two-and-a-half to three times" the number of weekly flu cases it normally sees in February, usually the worst month for getting a flu.
Just about all of the flu cases last fall, May suggested, could be linked to the H1N1 virus.
"We were seeing close to 1,000 flu cases a week last fall, when it's usually in the 300s during February," May said.
May, Dreyzehner and other health officials said one factor that has helped to keep H1N1 cases low has been the region's success so far in encouraging residents to get the vaccine.
Dreyzehner said that since last fall, when the vaccine first became available, some 20 percent of Southwest Virginia residents have received the vaccine, either by injection or nasal mist.
"We've been proud of the work we've been able to do," he said. "We've done more than 350 clinics, from fire stations to schools to grocery stores to motor-vehicle departments. But we need to keep getting more people to get the vaccine. We've got plenty of it, and it's free."
May said the Sullivan County Regional Health Department has administered between 18,000 and 19,000 vaccine doses since the fall -- and has plenty left for residents who still haven't been vaccinated.
The region's success in getting the H1N1 vaccine out -- along with an educational campaign that stresses such tips as using hand sanitizers and covering mouths while coughing -- has greatly helped to lower the flu's spread in schools, said Rebecca Craddock, school health coordinator for Bristol Tennessee Schools.
"What the health departments have been able to do has been nothing short of tremendous and amazing," Craddock said.
"They've been out literally everywhere, getting the vaccine out and the word out, too. That's had to have had a big impact in keeping the rates down."
During the height of H1N1's spread across the area last fall, one Bristol Tennessee School -- Vance Middle -- had 18 percent of its students absent with flu-like symptoms. But Craddock said the district hasn't faced any major issues with H1N1 for some time.
"We're not really seeing anything right now," Craddock said. "But no one's relaxing on this issue at all. We're keeping an eye on it."
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