Related story: Protecting kids from the flu

Related story: Preparing a small business for a pandemic

Lucas County health officials agreed that Northwest Ohio residents should not panic because of the swine flu cases around the country.
Toledo-Lucas County Health Department Deputy Health Commissioner Larry Vasko said the county is prepared to handle swine flu cases and has initiated plans developed during the avian flu and SARS outbreaks. Residents should remain calm.
“The most important things people can do are the common sense things to do,” said Ken Bertka, chief medical information officer for Mercy Health Partners. He said “common sense things to do” are washing hands frequently, coughing into your elbow instead of your hands and staying away from school or work if developing symptoms.

Swine flu virus seen through a microscope (AP).

Vasko said April 29 that residents should visit their family physicians if experiencing swine flu symptoms instead of going to the emergency room.
“Definitely it’s important to avoid disease and if you can avoid this disease, we need to do it,” Vasko said. “We have not seen the fatalities they have in Mexico, and boy are we ever glad of that.”
Vasko said because people are mobile, it is hard to predict how and where swine flu will develop.
“The child who came back into Elyria [Ohio] came back on a flight on Monday and was in school Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday,” he said. “People move a lot, and they come and go a lot, so it’s incredibly hard to predict where something would come from.”
Patty Hicks, manager of travel operation of AAA Northwest Ohio, said there has not been an increase in people canceling trips. Some passengers, she said, are choosing to switch their destination from Mexico to a Caribbean island.
Bertka said the incubation period for a flu will usually be from one or two days to a week. Swine flu, he said, appears to be only one or two days. Thus, if someone was in Mexico 10 days ago, and they’re not sick yet, they are not going to get sick, he said.
“It’s hitting people rapidly and hard,” Bertka said.
Bertka said typically with swine flu, the patients have experienced cold-like symptoms: a fever, dizziness, chills, coughing and occasionally nausea. Swine flu differs however, because it has a sudden onset.
While the test for flu is rapid, swine flu is not easily tested. A swab sample goes to a lab, most likely a state lab, to define if it is type A or type A swine flu, Bertka said.
Antiviral drugs are effective in the first 48 hours, Bertka said, and acetimetaphin is helpful to reduce the fever. He defined the overall treatment as “supportive care” — keeping the patient comfortable and hydrated. Bertka confirmed that the Mercy hospitals have not seen an increase in patients seeking care. ProMedica Health System deferred comment to the Toledo-Lucas County Health Department.
Vasko said if the situation worsens, Health Commissioner David Grossman will decide what precautions to take and if quarantine is necessary. There is also an information line for the state of Ohio, (866) 800-1404.

The nation’s first swine flu death, a toddler in Texas, is tragic but health experts say not unexpected, and they advise parents to just take ordinary precautions.
Every year dozens of U.S. children die from seasonal flu; that’s one reason annual flu shots are recommended for children 6 months and older. So far this season, 55 children have died from regular flu, federal health authorities report.
While children, especially those younger than 5, are known to be most vulnerable to severe and fatal complications from seasonal flu, most children who get even the most aggressive strains of flu don’t die.
So far, flu experts say there’s no reason to think the new strain will be much different.
“Nobody should be unduly worried; everybody should be aware of what’s going on and doing things they should be doing in flu season anyway,” said Dr. Mark Dworkin, an infectious disease specialist at University of Illinois at Chicago.
That includes covering your cough, washing your hands often — and telling children to do the same.
Dr. Carlos Perez-Velez, an infectious disease specialist with National Jewish Health system in Denver, says a good trick to get kids to wash their hands long enough to kill germs is to tell them to recite the alphabet A to Z before they quit washing.
Parents should also avoid sending children with fevers or other signs of illness to school, and should skip work if they have those symptoms — usual precautions when they or their kids are sick. Some wonder about keeping children home from preschool or day care — often called “germ factories” — even when their kids aren’t sick and no flu has been reported.
Dr. Kathryn Edwards, a Vanderbilt University flu specialist, said there’s no reason to keep healthy children home or restrict their activities.
“We need to respond to the swine flu just the way that we respond to seasonal flu,” Edwards said.
The death in Texas, of a 23-month-old boy visiting from Mexico City, “is very, very sad, but we do not have any evidence to say that the swine flu is more severe and will cause more deaths than other flu,” she said.
While there’s no vaccine to protect against the new swine flu strain, some are in development. Experts say parents should still be sure to get annual vaccines to protect children against seasonal flu.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 20,000 children younger than age 5 are hospitalized every year because of seasonal flu. In the 2007-08 flu season, the CDC received reports that 86 children nationwide died from flu complications.
In the 2003-04 season, one of the worst in recent years, at least 153 children died. Even so, the highest death rate was among infants younger than 6 months, and that was just 0.88 per 100,000 babies.
In that season, one-third of children who died had an underlying illness that put them at particularly high risk for severe flu complications and death. Illnesses known to increase children’s susceptibility include asthma and heart and lung problems.
Authorities say the boy who died in Texas had an underlying illness.
Young children are vulnerable to flu complications because their immature immune systems aren’t efficient at fighting off germs, said Dr. Kenneth Alexander, pediatric infectious diseases director at the University of Chicago. Also, young children have small airways that can swell when flu hits, predisposing them to pneumonia and fluid accumulating in the lungs, he said.
Alexander said parents should watch for classic flu symptoms, including fever of at least 100.5, cough and runny nose. Children old enough to talk might complain of sore throats and body aches.
Young children sometimes just have a runny nose and a fever with the flu, and they’re more likely than adults to have vomiting, too, he said.
Parents should contact their physicians if children have these symptoms, but experts said most cases won’t even be flu, let alone swine flu.
Young children with these symptoms who also are having trouble breathing, or who seem less alert or unable to drink liquid should see a doctor right away because these could be signs of dangerous complications, said Dr. Andrew Bonwit, a pediatrician at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Ill.

The federal government and local health departments have been warning the public about a possible influenza pandemic for years. Public Health departments have created communication campaigns to assist families and health care workers and schools prepare. Local small business owners, will need to assess the impact that the pandemic will have. That assessment needs to happen quickly, as cases of influenza are expected to spike in two to four weeks. There is no way to calculate exactly when the first surge of cases will hit the Midwest, but business owners who ignore the warning and the ticking clock will suffer the worst consequences.
Businesses can expect to lose 15 to 35 percent of their revenue as a result of the pandemic, mostly as a result of absenteeism during the peak of illnesses. Employees will either be sick themselves or taking care of family members who are sick.
Employees with young children may not be able to show up for work even if they and everyone they love remains healthy. Mexico closed all of its schools nationwide until May 8 to try to reduce the number of infections. As more domestic cases are identified, schools across the country will close to prevent the spread of the disease. It is reasonable to expect that local health care departments could mandate that day cares close when suspected and confirmed cases arise. With no day care options, many employees will not be able to come into work. While larger companies can shift responsibilities around to employees who can make it into work, small business owners will be left with no one to mind the store. Employees of small businesses will face specific challenges, because many of them will not be covered by the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA).
Family Medical Leave Act
FMLA became law in 1993 and was originally intended to provide job security for women who took time off to have a baby, but includes provisions for employees, both male and female, who need time off to care for newborn or newly adopted children or care for ill members of their immediate family.
In this pandemic, FMLA would not provide job security for

• part-time employees;
• full- or part-time employees of small businesses with less than 50 employees;
• employees who have worked for the same company less than one year;
• employees who need to take time off of work to care for members of their extended families: i.e. siblings, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews or cousins.

Ironically, the federal law originally intended to protect working mothers actually provides no protection for a significant portion of women in the work force. FMLA protection is a significant factor in assessing which populations face financial risks in the event of a pandemic.

• 40 percent of women in the United States work less than full time;
• 44 percent of women in Ohio work less than full time;
• 71 percent of single mothers in the United States work less than full time;
• 74 percent of single mothers in Ohio work less than full time;
• and 72 percent of married mothers in both the United States and Ohio work less than full time.

Small business owners tend to take great pride in the relationship they have with their employees. Family businesses often feel like family. One of the challenges entrepreneurs will face in this pandemic is retaining employees through the challenge. Old-fashioned common courtesy and application of the Golden Rule will go a long way in this regard. Small business owners who are understanding of employees who need to care for sick family members or who have no day care options in times of peak infections will be better able to retain good employees, and those employees will be more likely to stick around even in hard times. Of course, it will be much easier to be understanding with proper planning.
Set priorities, be flexible
A small business will be able to survive the pandemic if the business needs are assessed and prioritized, employees are crosstrained, and if business owners remain flexible in their response.
Businesses should literally take stock: figure out what is available, what supplies the business will need over the next six to eight weeks and what supplies the business can do without.
In larger companies, job descriptions and roles are clearly defined. In a small organization, many employees have to perform tasks and functions outside of the scope of their job description under normal circumstances. Work force flexibility will be a key factor in business survival during the pandemic. However, if employees are not crosstrained in other functions now, then key business functions will not be tended to during peak times of absenteeism. As you prioritize customers and essential services, prioritize key functions essential to keep the business running. Train everybody to do at least two other key functions outside of their job description.
Flexibility will be key to any organization’s survival. Entrepreneurs must go with the flow and be able to react without rigidity.
Work remotely
If you have employees who do not normally work from home, evaluate what tasks could be done remotely, or what equipment or tasks could be done from an employee’s home. While many white-collar- based small businesses can function completely via e-mail, other service-based businesses will find it challenging to stay open.
Planning is necessary
The best way for any organization to prepare for any disaster is to acknowledge that a disaster is possible. In the case of an influenza pandemic, many organizations have no plan. Businesses may have plans for other disasters, like acts of terrorism, crime, fire, floods and other weather-related events, and many businesses have insurance to cover losses for such events. However, there is no insurance policy for an influenza pandemic. While many companies discuss disaster preparedness in regards to preventing the spread of the flu virus, very few employers do the financial analysis that is necessary to truly prepare for the potential economic impact on an individual business. Families living in poverty or on the edge of poverty will be at the mercy of the virulence of the virus. Businesses have the opportunity and the obligation to prepare financially for the obvious needs of the community through appropriate analysis and planning.

Tricia Taylor, MPH, works as an outcomes analyst for a health care consulting firm. While attending the Northwest Ohio Consortium for Public Health, she participated in studies of the potential financial impact of an influenza pandemic in Wood County and on families living in poverty in Ohio.

The Jewels of Hope fundraiser to benefit the Hickman Cancer Center will take place from 1 to 5:30 p.m. May 3 at Loft & Home Essentials, 7103 W. Central Ave.
Loft & Home will donate 10 percent of all jewelry sales and 15 percent of all other sales to the Flower Hospital Foundation in support of the Hickman Cancer Center at the hospital.
A fashion show by Ragazza, of Perrysburg, will also take place at the fundraiser. Treo and The Vineyard, both of Sylvania, will provide food and beverages.
Jewels of Hope is co-hosted by Dakota Dwyer Designs. For more information contact the Flower Hospital Foundation at (419) 824-1721.

The military is bringing home the remains of two Ohio men who grew up within 20 miles of each other and died when their plane was shot down over the Pacific Ocean during World War II. Their families are now planning to bury them near their hometowns in northwest Ohio.

The military used DNA to confirm their identities after divers found their plane in 2004.

“It was a 65-year family mystery as to what really happened,” said Nikki Abbott, whose great-uncle Earl Yoh was among those killed. “Finding him is like solving the mystery.”

Both Yoh, who grew up in Scott, and Leland Price, who graduated from Oakwood High School, were staff sergeants on a B-24 Liberator that was shot down in September 1944 during a bombing mission against Japanese-held islands and airstrips in the South Pacific.

The two were from small towns about 60 miles south of Toledo and had never met until they were assigned to the same bomber, according to a newspaper article written after the plane was shot down.

Three of the 11 crew members parachuted from the plane and were captured and executed by the Japanese. The eight others were initially listed as missing in action and later presumed dead.

Sixty years later, volunteer divers searching for ships and aircraft lost around the Palau Islands found the bomber sitting in 70 feet of water.

Surviving family members provided DNA samples that allowed the Department of Defense to identify the remains. Three years ago, Leona Frederick provided a DNA sample that helped identify Price.

“This is so many years ago that it’s really unbelievable almost,” said Frederick, who is his aunt and closest surviving relative.

Price was 21 when he died. Frederick was just a few years older and remembers walking with him to school. She said he was “always crazy about airplanes.”

“We were more like sister and brother,” she said.

His mother took his death harder than anyone else. “He was their only boy, and she just had a broken heart,” Frederick said.

Price is expected to be buried in Riverside Cemetery in Defiance between his parents, Dean and Nellie. A headstone for all Dean says “World War II — lost in Palau Islands.”

Yoh will be buried May 9 at a cemetery near Haviland in a ceremony that will include a military fly-over. He was a 20-year-old tail gunner on the B-24 Liberator.

His remains were confirmed about two months ago.

“I started crying,” Abbott said. “I knew how everybody wanted him to come back and now he’s going to be laid to rest beside his parents.”

Owens student receives scholarship in honor of fallen detective

David Sims

Millbury resident David Sims was chosen to receive a $500 Detective Keith Dressel Memorial Scholarship for the upcoming 2009-10 academic year at Owens Community College. The scholarship, created two years ago, honors the legacy of Dressel who was fatally wounded on duty in 2007. Sims is pursuing his associate’s degree in criminal justice at Owens.

Owens announces Outstanding Service Award recipients

Five area police, fire and emergency medical? professionals, as well as two private citizens, have been chosen to? receive the sixth annual Outstanding Service Awards. The Owens Alumni Association selected the seven citizens for their contribution to Northwest Ohio’s communities.

The awards are:

• William Laveglia, Outstanding Police Officer Award
• Phillip Segur, Outstanding Firefighter Award
• David St. Johns, Outstanding Emergency Medical Technician Award
• Kyle Fulmer, Outstanding Service to the? Community Award
• Laurie Renz, Outstanding Service to the ?Community Award
• Donald Miller, Community Spirit Award
• Judy Miller, Community Spirit Award

The 2009 Charmed and Cherished Wine Tasting and Silent Auction Event will take place from 5:30 to 8 p.m. April 30 at Cousino’s Navy Bistro.
Tickets are $40 and include wine tasting and appetizers. The event is presented by Cherished Friends of Ahava. For more information, or to purchase tickets, call (419) 241-5877.

A ticket package that saves fans $90 per ticket for two major motorsports events was announced by Summit Motorsports Park, an NHRA track in Norwalk, Ohio, and Michigan International Speedway, a NASCAR track in Brooklyn, Mich., on April 27.

Racing fans can purchase a discounted Fan Value Pack ticket package that includes reserved seats, pit passes and free parking to two major races: the Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals June 25-28 in Ohio and the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Michigan 400 held Sunday, Aug. 16 in Michigan for $90.

The two tracks created the combined ticket package “to offer fans a better value, savings and convenience,” a news release said. The tracks are located 120 miles apart and have overlapping fan bases.

NHRA stars such as John Force, Greg Anderson and defending Funny Car champion Tony Pedregon will race down the drag strip up to 300 mph when the Christmas tree lights turn green at Summit Motorsports Park in June. In August, NASCAR stars Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Carl Edwards and Dale Earnhardt Jr., will race around the two-mile oval.

MIS president Roger Curtis said, “This ticket package is a great way to enjoy a diverse schedule of motorsports this summer. In this economy, race fans are looking for ways to save money while adding real entertainment value for the dollars they spend.”

“Both tracks have a lot of fans that attend both events,” added Bill Bader, Jr., president of Summit Motorsports Park. “This way they can purchase one ticket package that offers a lot of value.”

Fans buying the Fan Value Pack will get a reserved seat to the August NASCAR Sprint Cup event valued at $65 and a pit pass valued at $50, plus a reserved seat to the Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals for Saturday qualifying or Sunday final eliminations with a pit pass included, valued at $55. Parking is included at both events.

By buying both tickets in the Fan Value Pack, fans also save ticket service fees, adding up to a total of $90 in savings.

Fan Value Pack tickets will be available through the Summit Motorsports Park ticket office.

Fans from either track can buy tickets for both races through Summit Motorsports Park by calling (419) 668-5555 or by going to http://www.SummitMotorsportsPark.com and looking for the Fan Value Pack icon. Visa and MasterCard are accepted.

The Fan Value Pack combination is a limited time offer will only be available through Monday, June 15.

The Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals is the 12th race of the 24-race NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series. The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series event at Michigan International Speedway is the 23rd race of the 36-race NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

Cuts in state and county spending are threatening to shut down 4-H clubs in several states, leaving parents and supporters scrambling to fill the gap to keep programs going.

Voters in one Ohio county will decide in May whether to approve a levy that will keep 4-H and other agriculture services operating.

“It irritates me how our community thinks we can just drop this,” said Julie Snyder, whose three sons have been in 4-H in central Ohio’s Morrow County. “We’re not just campaigning for 4-H, we’re campaigning to keep our agriculture going.”

Bright red barns, county fairs and 4-H: Few symbols better represent the nation’s agricultural heritage.

But the steady decline in the number of people who have ties to agriculture means there’s also less appreciation — and in some cases support — for 4-H programs even though they teach kids who aren’t just from farms. About half of the 6 million children taking part in 4-H come from cities and suburbs.

The nonprofit 4-H program that began in 1902 is administered and funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and also receives funding from states and counties.

With budgets everywhere shrinking, 4-H is no longer immune.

In Louisiana, some county 4-H advisers are in danger of losing their jobs. A 4-H center in Milan, Tenn., where youngsters learn swimming and canoeing is scheduled to close this summer.

Washington County commissioners outside Minneapolis voted last month to eliminate the $130,000 it spends each year on 4-H. They said the expense was too much at a time when they’re cutting $3.1 million and 21 other jobs.

“We’re going to do whatever we can to save the program,” said Carrie Anderson, whose two teenage sons are fourth-generation 4-H members.

Her home in Stillwater, Minn., is filled with furniture — including coffee tables, benches and bookcases — that her sons made for their 4-H woodworking projects. They’ve also raised beef cattle and pigs.

But what is more important, she said, they’ve learned about responsibility and respect for others. She wishes others could see the positive impact it has on young lives.

“Our county commissioners didn’t deny it was a good program,” she said. “They just didn’t want it funded by taxpayer dollars.”

Keeping 4-H alive will mean higher dues for parents, she said. “It’s going to turn much more into a fundraising program,” she said. “We got lots of letters of support, but nobody had money to back it up.”

Residents and businesses in Allen County in northwest Ohio have raised about $100,000 in recent months to privately fund 4-H after cuts were made to the Ohio State University extension office that oversees the program.

“We’ve found out just how important the 4-H program is to families,” said Jay Begg, who manages the county fair and is helping with the fundraising.

“I’m sympathetic to the funding issues the commissioners have, but my priorities are a little different,” he said.

In Louisiana, a proposed $13.3 million cut for the Louisiana State University Agricultural Center would mean the loss of about 100 extension instructors and staff, including 4-H educators.

That has prompted residents from around the state to lobby lawmakers for more funding, said Paul Coreil, director of the Louisiana Cooperative Extension Service.

“They won’t accept the reductions,” he said. “It’s sacred to a point, but they see the results, too.”

The 4-H programs — whether they’re about photography, science or sewing — are diverse enough to capture the interest of any child and go beyond what they learn in school, Coreil said.

“They can’t provide some of these life skills that we can,” he said.

On the Net: 4-H Web site: http://4-h.org/

Toledo’s Amtrak Station will host the second annual National Train Day Celebration from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 2 at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Plaza at 415 Emerald Ave., Downtown.

The event, hosted by the National Association of Railroad Passengers and Amtrak, is a nationwide commemoration of the first transcontinental railroad system completed May 10, 1869.

Beginning at 9:30 a.m. there will be opening remarks from Senator Teresa Fedor, Representative Peter Ujvagi, Mayor Carty Finkbeiner, Amtrak Senior Government Affairs Officer Derrick James and Stuart Nicholson of the Ohio Rail Development Commission.

There will be model railroad displays, Amtrak and freight trains on site to tour, music, free Amtrak train travel planning, food, drawings and other family-friendly activities.

For more information contact Beth McCray Gill at (419) 536-0993.