The St. Athanasius and St. John principal sent a letter to parents.
RUMFORD – Officials at St. Athanasius and St. John School on Franklin Street notified parents of students about whooping cough after two students were suspected of having the contagious disease.
On Wednesday, Principal Don Fournier said he received confirmation that a sixth-grader had the disease. The other student tested negative for it about two weeks ago.
“That’s mild compared to what it could be,” said Fournier. “It can be contagious if children and adults are not immunized against it.”
Fournier said as soon as school officials learned that a student might have the disease, they sent a letter from a Maine Department of Human Services health official to parents of children at the pre-school through eighth-grade school.
He said the infected child was put on antibiotics before officials knew what the disease was, “so I can’t imagine that it will spread.”
In the letter to parents, Jiancheng Huang, an epidemiologist with the Maine Bureau of Health Immunization Program in Augusta, acknowledged receiving a report about the sixth-grader.
“Following the disease transmission pattern, we believe your child might be exposed to the disease in the classroom or the basketball team. The purpose of this memorandum is not to alarm you,” Huang wrote.
Huang’s memo instead provides health information to alert parents to the signs and symptoms of pertussis.
Pertussis, Huang said, is a communicable disease that is spread from person to person, especially through coughing.
“It usually begins with cold-like symptoms (sore throat, running nose, etc.), and often develops into a bad cough after a few weeks,” Huang said.
The cough can last for a very long time, often up to several weeks or more.
“Most children in the classroom and basketball team have had the vaccine before their age of seven years old, but their immunity to the disease may gradually wane over time,” Huang added.
To prevent the spread of whooping cough at the school, state immunization program officials recommend the following:
• If a child has a cold or persistent cough, talk to a health care provider.
• Children with pertussis will be started on antibiotics, and will need to remain at home for five days. These details are to be worked out by the child’s health care provider.
• Family members and other close contacts of children with pertussis should get antibiotics as well.
• Children who are less than seven years old, who are close contacts of someone with pertussis, and who are not up-to-date on pertussis immunization, should receive booster shots.
Huang advised parents who are not sure if their children are up-to-date with pertussis shots to contact a health care provider or call the Bureau of Health at 800-867-4775 for information.
To learn more about whooping cough or to hear what the cough sounds like, visit www.whoopingcough.net/.
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