New London - Eight Coast Guard Academy cadets are ill with swine flu and are being treated in an isolated area of the campus, an academy spokesman said Friday.
The first case was detected Tuesday, said Ryan Doss, assistant public affairs officer, and all eight cases have been confirmed with tests to be swine flu, also called novel H1N1 influenza.
Six of the ill cadets are first-year swabs taking part in mandatory summer training, and the other two are older cadets who are instructing the swabs, Doss said. About 285 swabs are on campus, along with a group of older cadets training them.
Doss said all eight students have mild, typical flu-like symptoms, including low-grade fever with an average temperature of about 101 degrees. They are being treated by academy medical staff. The ill students are staying in a dormitory area separated from where the rest of the cadets are staying and are using separate bathrooms, he added.
”We've upgraded all our cleaning procedures to hospital level,” he said. “We've also given all the cadets additional time to clean and sanitize their rooms, and are re-emphasizing good hygiene and making sure all the hand sanitizer dispensers are kept fully stocked.”
Anyone with H1N1 symptoms is being given the anti-viral medication Tamiflu, Doss said.
All academy staff and cadets have been notified, along with all the high school students taking part in the AIM program on campus this summer, and their parents. AIM, which stands for Academy Introduction Mission, has a class of about 180 high school juniors learning about the Coast Guard for possible future admission, and another class is scheduled to attend AIM later this summer. Doss said current and incoming AIM students have been offered the chance to withdraw from the program, but none has done so.
A Coast Guard medical team from Washington, D.C., is scheduled to visit the academy this weekend to review all the steps taken to control the outbreak and make recommendations, Doss added.
The annual excursion for swabs aboard the sailing barque Eagle is still scheduled to embark July 25 with no changes, Doss said.
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