Schools Giving Free H1N1 Vaccines to Students

Columbia (WLTX) - School and health officials around the state have a new plan to tackle the H1N1 virus, and parents should be receiving word this week.

DHEC is partnering with those schools to offer the H1N1 vaccine to students for free. It is not a mandatory immunization but in most districts, parents will have to make the decision this week. "We feel that this is a public health crisis, we want to get the vaccine to as many students as we can," says Dawn MacAdams, lead nurse for Richland School District Two.

MacAdams sees sick kids all day long. "We've seen influenza-like illness in the schools since school started and we're starting to see another little upswing, a few more cases here and there in each school," she says.

To help keep her office a bit emptier, schools in her district will soon provide free H1N1 vaccines to students, with parental consent. "Permission forms are going home today. They'll be due back by Friday," MacAdams explains, "From what I've heard to so far, most parents are really appreciative that we're making the effort to provide these vaccines at school."

As opposed to immunizations like those for measles, not having this vaccine won't keep your child out of school. It's more of a convenience for parents that want it. "If a parent does not want to have their child vaccinated, that's fine; or if they want to have them vaccinated with their local doctor, that's okay. We hope they pursue that," says DHEC spokesperson Adam Myrick, "Ultimately, we hope to have a great turnout and a great response so we can get as many school children vaccinated against H1N1 as possible."

Richland Two is expecting the process to go smoothly. "We've set it up along the same lines of how we do mass health screenings - vision and hearing - and kind of just changed to include that we'll be doing vaccinations," says MacAdams.

But the date when she can start to expect a lighter work load is still in question. "We have the green light that we will be going as soon as there's enough supply on-hand to begin vaccinating," she says.

DHEC is hoping that will happen sometime early to mid-November. The schools will only be administering the shot-form of the vaccine, not the nasal spray.

Packets with information about the risks and benefits will accompany the permission slips when they're sent home.