Henry County sees rise in illnesses and watches for others

MT. PLEASANT — Influenza cases remain high in Henry County, with multiple schools reporting absentee rates exceeding 10%, according to a monthly update from Public Health Director Katie Reuter at the Feb. 6 department head meeting with the Henry County Board of Supervisors.

“We continue to see high rates of influenza in the county,” Reuter said. “Schools are required to report greater than 10% absences, and across the state, there's been over 130 schools this week that have reported absences.”

Waco High School is the latest local school to report high illness-related absences, following similar trends at Harlan and Lincoln elementary schools in previous weeks.

“Most of it is influenza, a little bit of COVID, and some strep,” Reuter explained.

Despite the high numbers, the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services (IHHS) does not recommend school closures due to illness, leaving that decision up to individual districts.

“The state doesn't ever recommend that a school close if they have high rates of illnesses. That's up to the schools themselves,” Reuter said. “We haven’t had any here that closed.”

Beyond human influenza cases, public health officials are closely monitoring an outbreak of highly pathogenic bird flu (HPAI) at a poultry farm in O’Brien County.

“There was another poultry farm in O’Brien County that tested positive for the highly pathogenic bird flu,” Reuter reported. “So that’s being followed by IHHS. And then they’re also following a dairy herd in Nevada, and also a duck farm in California.”

To combat the spread of influenza, the state has allocated additional funding for flu vaccines, which Henry County Public Health has made available. Public Health has also sent letters to poultry farms in the county inquiring if anyone would like to take advantage of these additional vaccines.

Meanwhile, public health officials are also tracking a tuberculosis (TB) outbreak in Kansas City, which Reuter described as the largest in U.S. history. According to Reuter, they are following over 70 active cases and 100 latent cases in that area.

Additionally, an alert issued by IHHS on Jan. 27 warned of an increased number of TB cases among individuals who emigrated from the Pacific islands. While Henry County has not reported any cases of this nature, Reuter emphasized the importance of awareness.

Henry County Supervisor Marc Lindeen inquired about quarantine procedures for TB cases, to which Reuter explained, “They will be quarantined to their home if they have an active case. So, if they’re infectious, it takes a lot of time, a lot of effort.”

She added that public health officials must monitor treatment closely by going directly to the individuals’ homes and monitoring them taking their medications.

“It’s not a week course of antibiotics, we’re talking six to nine months,” Reuter said.

According to Reuter, federal funding has been another area of concern for public health officials. She noted that recent executive orders have caused confusion, as funding was paused and later reinstated.

“A lot of our grants are federally funded, so we are watching that closely,” she said. “But they told us, as far as what’s going on, it should be business as usual, and our communication with them has been good.”

During the meeting, Reuter also discussed a new initiative from the Iowa Cancer Consortium, which is focusing on rising cases of four major types of cancer: lung, breast, prostate, and melanoma.

“They’re hoping to put more funding into those initiatives,” she said.

Comments: AnnaMarie.Kruse@southeastiowaunion.com