I saw something on TV a week or two ago that got me to wondering. For those of you with kids, do your kids' schools have a full-time "school nurse"? Especially with budgetary cuts, it seems that many schools are without one, or at least share one nurse among many schools.

Many schools will "send children home" (or more accurately, call the parents to pick them up) if they are showing flu-like symptoms, but if you don't have a school nurse, who makes that determination? Just the teacher? That might seem natural at the elementary school level where teachers are more like surrogate parents, but seems more unusual at the junior and high school levels where kids are shuttling around to different teachers every hour.

I'm just curious how schools are handling this situation.

Not a whole lot on the H1N1 topic recently except the vaccine seems to be coming along and looks like it will only require one jab, not two. However, depending on who you ask, the autumn H1N1 peak could be over by the time there is enough vaccine to roll out sometime next month. But H1N1 is hitting us very early this year, so there's still enough winter months left for a third wave of H1N1 before next spring.

An interesting tidbit I just read about how long someone with H1N1 is infectious. The standard advice we've been hearing recently is to stay home for at least 24 hours from when your fever breaks. However, people with H1N1 seem to remain infectious for a lot longer than seasonal flu. That's just going to make it harder to avoid catching, unless everyone can take off even MORE time from school and work to recuperate.

Can read about this latest news here.

Our schools have a nurse at each facility, but she is overworked to the Nth degree. That makes the entire system a PIA. Our kids just text us with a request to come home if they do not feel well. We then call in and check them out. DS is 17 and drives himself. DD is 14 and we still have to go get her.