Three summer camps in our area are dealing with an outbreak of H1N1 influenza.
Bill Mindell, the Director of Clinical Service at the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit, says about 18 per cent of campers at the camps are involved in the outbreak and 13 per cent of staff are affected as well.
That works out to about 225 kids who have contracted the virus.
Mindell says the virus is clearly embedded in community, so someone who was ill with swine flu came to the camp, and the virus spread.
He says it’s not surprising to them that their dealing with an outbreak, and he adds the 3 camps would have been infected independently.
Mindell says all the cases are mild, and no one has been admitted to hospital.
He says the health unit has given advice to the camps on how to handle the virus and how to screen kids who are coming to camps in the future that might be ill.
Mindell says the affected camps are excluding campers who are ill until they get better, and the camps have also put in normal infection control measures too.
And he says the outbreaks are under control from the health unit’s perspective, and all the parents have been notified from the camps about the outbreak too.
Mindell says we need to keep the outbreak in perspective, and realize this isn’t a reason to not sent children to camps this summer, as there are many, many camps that are not involved in the outbreak.