With Flu Widespread around the State, BU Holds Student Vaccination Clinic Friday

BU Student Health Services nurse Helen Lynch gives a flu shot to Andoni Asencor (CAS’20) last year. An additional flu vaccine clinic will be held at FitRec on Friday. Photo by Sarah Silbiger (COM’18)

With Massachusetts and much of the country reporting widespread influenza cases, BU has scheduled an additional campus vaccination clinic for students on Friday, January 25.

The clinic will run from 9 am until 3 pm on the FitRec lower-level basketball courts, accessible across the street from 25 Buick Street (signs on Buick will direct students to the clinic). Flu shots for faculty and staff are available at the Occupational Health Center at 930 Commonwealth Ave.

“Prevention remains the key, and the flu vaccine can take up to two weeks before it is maximally effective, so students should come to the clinic,” says Judy Platt, director of Student Health Services (SHS). “At this point, we at SHS have not seen many cases of flu, but it tends to peak in February, so we most likely will be seeing students with flu or flu-like illnesses very soon.”

Clinical labs have confirmed about 2,200 Massachusetts cases so far this season of types A and B influenza. “Given widespread flu activity in at least 30 states,” Platt says, “there is an increasing likelihood that returning students will be exposed to the influenza.”

Last year’s flu season was the deadliest in more than three decades, killing 80,000 people in the United States and infecting an estimated 49 million. The death toll included 180 children. In the 14 years since tracking of child flu deaths began, only 2009’s swine flu deaths number (358) was worse.

The latest CDC data—for the week ending January 12—show “elevated” influenza nationally. Up to seven million Americans have gotten the illness, with one of this season’s victims drawing particular media attention: 26-year-old conservative commentator Bre Payton, who died in December after coming down with influenza and developing a brain inflammation.

Beyond getting a shot, Platt suggests the following steps to lessen the chances you’ll be sick in bed this winter instead of in class:

· Take care of yourself by eating nutritious foods, drinking plenty of fluids, exercising, getting enough sleep, and trying to reduce stress.
· Wash your hands often.
· Cough into your sleeve or a tissue, not your hands.
· Avoid people with the flu if possible.
· Clean areas in your home, room, and any shared area that you touch often, such as door and sink handles and toilets, with Clorox wipes or antibacterial cleansers.

If you do get the flu, Platt says, you should:

· Stay in bed and rest. Avoid crowded places like classrooms, dining halls, and FitRec, where you risk infecting more people. Students on a University meal plan can reserve meals online for a friend to pick up and deliver. If you’re not on a meal plan, have food delivered to your residence.
· Employees who believe they’ve caught the flu should head home.
· Identify a flu buddy who can get your meals for you and pick up Ibuprofen or Tylenol if you need it.
· Reach out to professors early, to alert them that you’re sick and will miss class.

Students who think they have the flu and need additional advice can go to the SHS patient connect website. After securely logging in, they’ll be brought to the patient connect portal. Select “Primary care/medical” and then select “Send a nurse a message.”

Students who are concerned about a life-threatening medical issue should contact Boston University Police at 617-353-2121 or 911.

The University will also use Friday’s clinic to test-run its emergency response if there were to be a disease outbreak on campus.

Should a mass immunization be required on campus—to counter, say, a meningitis B outbreak—SHS would collaborate with other University departments to contain it, Platt says. So the flu clinic will include attendance by, or help from, representatives of the University’s Emergency Management, Residential Life, Environmental Health & Safety, Facilities Management & Planning, and public relations departments, FitRec, and the BU Police Department.