H1N1: Stay Healthy! Wednesday, October 07, 2009 By Elizabeth Sharkey Taylor Bogle demonstrates how to stay healthy. - Advertising H1N1, also known as the swine flu, is a new influenza virus causing people to get ill and its spreading from person to person worldwide. There are many symptoms such as fever over 100.4 °F, cough, sore throat, headache, chills, muscle aches, diarrhea, and vomiting. Though the illness spreads rapidly and can have dire results, preventing yourself from having H1N1 bascially comes down to what you've learned ever since you were little. Brian Schok from the Clinton County Health Department says it's important especially for students to take precautions. "Both you and the people around you should cough or sneeze into their arms not on their hands. Also you should wash your hands often, and to prevent from others getting sick obviously you should stay at home if you're sick. We have already spoken to all the schools and we told them they should encourage good hygienic habits like giving students enough time to wash their hands during the day and keep hand sanitizer available. Also the teachers should encourage the students if they are sick then they need to stay at home. If they happen to get sick at school then they need to be removed from the classroom until someone comes and gets them. The things we are encouraging have always been the things we have encouraged in the previous years. There is no real change here--we are just stressing this a little more this year."   Sophomore Taylor Bogle was sick for four days, but had to stay home for six on doctors orders. Taylor had a fever, headache, coughing, sneezing, chills, loss of appetite, stuffy nose, and wheezing so she went to the doctor. Taylor explains "My doctor tested me for Influenza A, which I had. It is possible I might have had H1N1, but from what I understood from my doctor was he would of tested me for H1N1 but the test kits aren't available to this area. The government officials go to the area with the most serious cases to test for H1N1. My case was very mild, and may have just been the regular Influenza A." Taylor was lucky. H1N1 could be very serious, so if you think you have symptoms, contact your doctor and they will ask you some questions on the phone and they will let you know what you need to do from there, either go to the hospital or make an appointment.

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