Eleven states had a flu outbreak during the past few months and the La Mirada area has been elevated to a “high” status as of last week for the incidence of influenza, according to Marsha H. Schreiber, director of Student Health Services.

“There have been twenty cases of influenza in the past two weeks and lots of students have the mimicking symptoms of the disease,” said Schreiber.

Symptoms of the flu include a fever (usually high), headache, extreme tiredness, dry cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, and muscle aches, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. The flu spreads from person to person and is highly contagious, according to Schreiber, which makes this a dangerous situation for students who are living in close quarters.

“It bugs me that people have influenza and don’t care about possibly giving it to me,” stated Laura Schmatt, a freshman at Biola.

Schreiber stressed the importance of hygiene as the key component to stopping the spread of influenza. That includes washing hands frequently, following cough etiquette by coughing into one’s own sleeve, covering the nose and mouth when sneezing, avoiding the reuse of tissues, and staying away from the habit of drinking and eating after anyone.

If these prevention techniques fail, Schreiber recommends that a person with a high fever should stay in bed, drink lots of fluid, treat the fever with Tylenol and stay away from a group activity in order to stop the spread of influenza.

Getting a flu shot now is not advisable, said Schreiber, because it takes about two weeks for the body to build antibodies. However, she would like to see every resident at Biola University getting a flu shot in 2009 to help reduce the spread of the virus.