Cases of Flu Across County Appear Down but Not Out

People worried that they could still come down with the flu or a nasty cold this season can rest easy.

Sort of.

The general consensus in clinics and doctors’ offices around the county is that the worst is over.

Maybe.

“We’ll still see flu through April,” county epidemiologist Marilyn Billimek said Wednesday. But “I think we can say the flu season is at a slow roll right now.”

Billimek said pockets of “stomach flu” reported at such locales as Oxnard High School and the Center for Family Health in Ventura are not classical cases of influenza, but another virus.

According to pediatric nurse-practitioner Lisa Guravitz of the Center for Family Health, “colds and influenza have quieted down this week, but stomach flu is up. A lot.”

At Oxnard High School, attendance clerk Cheryl Hooper said that student absenteeism is up. “At first it was more bronchitis-type illness, but this time around it’s more the stomach flu. I think we have also quite a few subs [in]. My husband is sick too.

“It seems like more kids are coming to school ill. Runny noses, they can’t talk, sore throats and they have to go home.”

And at Topa Topa Elementary School in Ojai, substitute school secretary Nancy Dennis has seen no signs that the flu season is ebbing.

“Both school secretaries are sick, so I got called in at 11 a.m.,” Dennis said Tuesday. “And looking down the absence list by date, there are an awful lot of kids out today: 28 kids. On Feb. 10, for instance, half as many were out. The calls coming in seem to be a lot about sore throats.”

At the Thousand Oaks High School attendance office, Carol Gonzalez said Tuesday that student absences were at the normal rate, but that she was not feeling so well.

“I had a different virus a month ago, and on Friday I caught something similar, a different strain,” Gonzalez said. “It’s been awful.”

Still, schools such as McKevett Elementary in Santa Paula, Piru Elementary and Meiners Oaks Elementary all report a steady improvement in attendance from the nadir at the end-of-year holidays.

“I think we’ve hit our peak with the flu,” said Gay Ferrante, Meiners Oaks school manager. “Our absences now are because of the rain. In Meiners Oaks we have canyon kids whose parents can’t get them to school.”

Annette Andrade of Community Family Practice and Urgent Care in Ventura is another who thinks the flu has peaked. “It’s tapered down for us in the last two weeks. . . . The first of the year was the worst.”

The influenza season won’t be considered over until the end of March, said Dr. James Halverson of Ojai, a family practitioner. Halverson said he has been seeing more colds and bronchitis in his practice this week.

“It has slacked off a bit--but it doesn’t mean it’s over,” he said.