Before H1N1 strikes Valley hard, who you going to call? Flu busters

By William K. Alcorn

People over 65 without underlying medical conditions will be last to get the swine flu vaccine.

YOUNGSTOWN — “If we do this right, we’ll avoid a [swine flu] epidemic,” said Dr. Jay Osborne, medical director for Forum Health Northside Medical Center.

And doing it right is what a multi-agency swine flu group, nicknamed “flu busters,” has been working on for months.

Part of the group’s focus is on school students, from kindergarten to college, who are among the population groups targeted to get the first round of swine-flu vaccine when it becomes available, said Mahoning County Health Commissioner Matthew Stefanak, who co-chairs the group with Dr. John Venglarcik, the county health district’s medical director.

“We are in the midst of surveying school districts to see if they are interested in hosting H1N1 flu clinics,” Stefanak said.

H1N1 is the medical designation for swine flu.

In the school districts where there are school nurses and enough volunteers, they will be able to manage flu clinics are their own. However, in smaller school districts which may not have enough resources or personnel, public health may have to send in nurses and volunteers, Stefanak said.

The college-age population is one the groups being hardest hit by the H1Ni virus.

Read the full story Monday in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com.