Tips from MCHS On How to Stay Healthy This Cold and Flu Season

We strive to have all children in school each day, however, please consider these things before you send them to school.

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(Madison, Ind.) - As the news reports become more and more prevalent around the unfolding COVID-19 virus or Coronavirus, we wanted to reach out with a few simple reminders for keeping everyone healthy during the ongoing cold and flu season. School attendance is very important.

We strive to have all children in school each day, however, if your student is not feeling well; please consider these things before you send them to school:

● Do they have a fever?

● Do they have a prolonged, ongoing dry or productive cough?

● Have they been vomiting or presenting with diarrhea?

If so, has it been 24 hours since their last episode? If the answers to any of these are yes, then you may want to consider a visit to your family physician and we ask that you keep them home from school until they are symptom-free.

We ask for your help at home to remind your child to:

● WASH HANDS with warm water and soap - as OFTEN as possible. This is our best defense against spreading germs!!

● Cover their mouth when they cough and/or sneeze.

● Keep unwashed hands away from their eyes, nose, and mouth.

● Keep their hands to themselves, especially when not feeling well.

● Do not eat or drink after others.

We monitor daily attendance and seek feedback from the building administrator and school nurse if/when they feel there is a spike in illness activity resulting in days out of school. If you remember, earlier in the school year there was a concern of flu-like symptoms at Rykers’ Ridge Elementary so we closed the school on a Friday, utilized an eLearning day, and custodians did a deep clean in the building.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has excellent, up to date information on the developing factual data around the COVID- 19 virus. Here is a link to a fact sheet resource from the CDC website about What you need to know about coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

We will be working closely with our community healthcare professionals in the event this becomes a concern. We are confident we have plans in place should the need arise that we would need to address a localized, heightened awareness situation.

We appreciate your assistance with these simple prevention methods in order to keep everyone as healthy as possible.