SPRINGDALE — Test results confirmed the norovirus was what sickened hundreds of children at Hellstern Middle School last week, a School District spokesman said Monday.
The norovirus causes a person’s stomach and intestines or both to become inflamed, leading to stomach pain, nausea, diarrhea and vomiting, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is highly contagious.
About one-third of Hellstern’s approximately 900 sixth- and seventh-graders either didn’t come to school at all or went home early Thursday because of illness. Some staff members also got sick.
School at Hellstern was canceled Friday to give students time to recover and to help prevent further spreading of the virus. Monday was a districtwide teacher in-service day and there was no school.
Classes were set to resume at all schools, including Hellstern, today.
“Hellstern has been completely disinfected and every bus utilized by the Springdale district was sterilized Thursday evening,” district spokesman Rick Schaeffer said. “We are anticipating school as normal. Obviously we will be monitoring the attendance at Hellstern.”
Every stool sample collected from infected children tested positive for norovirus, Schaeffer said, passing along information from the Arkansas Department of Health. State health officials had suspected the norovirus last week, but were awaiting test results for confirmation.
The school contacted some parents of sick children Friday. Those parents reported their children already were feeling better, Schaeffer said.
Dirk Haselow, epidemiologist for the state, said last week confirming the cause as norovirus would be the best-case scenario because it would eliminate the need for additional investigation into the cause, which he said would be “an involved process.”
Norovirus is not related to the flu, or influenza, which is a respiratory illness. Norovirus is passed easily from person to person, making it possible to reach the numbers it did at Hellstern, Haselow said.
The best way to help prevent norovirus is to practice proper hand-washing and general cleanliness, according to the CDC.