Winter bugs are out of control these days, aren't they?

[RogGestYeGerryMentlemen]

What on earth is going on? Primary schools local to me have had to close due to the d&v bug making the rounds. In one school, almost three quarters of students were absent. People seem to be catching it just by looking at each other, and it seems to be a particularly severe one, with people getting dehydrated as they are vomiting constantly and are unable to keep anything down.

I don't remember anything like this when I was a child. Yes you would get a bug doing the rounds, but you'd have a few years of catching everything when you started school, then it would ease off by age 8 or so.... I didn't catch a vomiting bug from I was 8 until I was about 15! Not to say I wasn't off sick for other reasons, but these vomiting bugs weren't the inevitable yearly event they are now.

My mum was a nurse for years, she reckons it's using antibac/disinfectant over soap and water - she says when she started her nursing training, they would obviously disinfectant certain things, but everything else would be given a good regular scrub down with soap and roasting hot water, and they had a massive barrel of rock salt which they'd scoop out and put in patient's baths, and she said wound infections weren't anything like now, and MRSA was unheard of.

I've actually changed this summer from antibac sprays to the more old fashioned cleaners like Stardrops and Vim, and bar soap instead of the dettol stuff, and touch wood we haven't had anything yet

My son had D&V last week because his reception teacher took her toddler to school who had D&V so couldn’t attend nursery. School attempted to keep this quiet but said toddler vomited more than once in front of all the children and the two TA’s, one of which works heavily with my son.

I'm confused
Are anti bacterial sprays good or bad for the post vom clean up?
I had the norovirus bug a few weeks - wasn't good but thankfully no one else in the house got it

Antibacterial stuff is useless against norovirus

Hot soapy water for Norovirus. Or quite a strong bleachy solution with soap and hot water.
Hot wash and tumble dry for bedding and towels etc.

I genuinely think it’s the (relatively) warmer weather we get now and air-con everywhere. My DGPs and DPs always used to say that a good winter frost would kill the bugs. It’s been very cold and frosty here the last couple of days but rainy/damp before that. I’ve had a truly awful cough/throat thing for nearly a week.

MSRA is a result of antibiotic resistance. It has nothing to do disinfectants.

As for bugs we’ve had no at all so far this winter. Had a couple last year though although I’ve always had the worst d&v type illnesses in summer.

It's been bad where I live but I work in a school so I guess I would see it more than others. I think the increase is down to the amount of children who aren't kept of school/nursery long enough to recover/stop spread of infection. You'd be shocked at the amount of children I see weekly that are sent in when they are clearly unwell and should be in bed.

Off*

*1. Attendance pressures at school

1. Sending children back to school too early
2. Not enough hand washing
3. People mistakenly believing that anti bac gel is better than hand washing*

Agreed. I’ll add

1. People who don’t cover their mouth when they cough. I’ve taught my DS to cough into the crook of his elbow (thereby not covering his hands with germs that then get spread around the place), but the number of people who don’t bother just astounds me.

With vaccines for everything and antibiotics, people have forgotten the importance of basic hygiene measures that not so long ago would have been crucial to prevent the spread of illness that could have been fatal for some.

“Coughs and sneezes spread diseases” !

ColdRainAgain is correct. Norovirus is a virus so no amount of any bacteria killing chemicals will kill it.
Soap and water for hand washing
Bleach and hot soapy water for washing surfaces.

They're thought to be linked @Velveteenfruitbowl

theconversation.com/hospital-disinfectants-should-be-regulated-like-antibiotics-new-study-suggests-113284

Sounds like a public health campaign with ACCURATE info would be great for everyone...

(not bashing anyone here - it’s complicated. As a society though, we should surely be able to get this right!? We need to!)

I haven’t read the article ColdRainAgain but I know in the NE we have norovirus and flu doing the rounds.

I blame working mums - kids get shoved back to school when they are still I'll because of the pressure to be at work. When I was a kid forty years ago, most mums stayed at home so if you were ill you stayed at home until you were better.

You mean working parents? It is possible for mum to work and dad to be at home (gasp!)

Antibac does nothing for norovirus (for whoever was asking). You need to wash your hands thoroughly with soap and water quite regularly and use a bleach solution to clean up vom, diarrhoea and any surrounding areas. Sterizar is the only commercially available non bleach spray that can kill norovirus.

@fascinated Sorry!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We've had schools close round here too. DS's school has been hit quite bad but not closed. The problem is the schools aren't cleaned properly with appropriate anti viral cleaning products, people send their kids back too soon , oh and our school recently told us they're now greeting all the kids with a handshake in the morning - I mean, worst idea ever surely . Thankfully DS's teacher isn't doing it. And then of course all the homebaking at the Christmas concerts bang in the middle of flu/noro season, er no thanks.

NI here too, thankfully we’ve avoided the dreaded boke plague so far, but 2/3 of children were off in DD’s year on Friday. Norovirus is awful isn’t it, I remember the awful stomach pains from a few years ago.

I've been absolutely floored the last few days with a horrendous cold. I've never taken time off for a cold before in almsot 40 years of working
I got up and started to drive to work and realised I was not safe to drive so I went home and spent three days in bed.
I've only just stared this job and whilst I have no probabtion period it's the last thing I need.
I've had the flu jab so I know it's not flu but I haven't been able to get up for three days. I'm sure I haven't had a cold like this before.

@fishcakey -I suppose it’s the fact so many people are pressured into having both parents work full time to manage. It’s a shame society can’t change to accommodate a combo of both parents working part time, if that would help them .

Not where I aM. I read about this 'lurgy' people have apparently been so stricken with on here all the time. Not happened to anyone near me IRL.

Big issues at lots of schools in Yorkshire and further North from what I have read. I know of several schools which have had to close for a deep clean.

At my nephew's primary school they had 150 children off on one day.

At my infant school our sickness for November is way higher than previous years. We haven't had the huge numbers on one day but we have had steady numbers across school for 2-3 weeks now.
Started with EYFS - had half of one class off in the first week on two days - and has spread to the other years, affecting children and staff. Only this week I had a child be sick across my classroom, including on to me. Our poor caretaker is dealing with cleaning up vomit most days at the moment. We've now got children who are starting to be off for the second time with the bug.

We are trying really hard to implement the 48 hours, but we have to trust the parents as to when the last bout of sickness was.

We are supervising hand washing and using anti bac gel in school, and trying to ensure school is clean. I have spent a lot of time cleaning stuff in my room. But it feels like a losing battle.

Interesting about the blood group thing. I must read up on that. We’ve never had norovirus; I thought it was just luck/strong constitutions, but blood group resistance could explain it.

I am however currently in bed with full on, Victorian style influenza...

It's lack of personal hygiene.

I can't believe the amount of people who cough and sneeze without covering their mouths. Or who leave public toilets without washing their hands. Or who hold hand rails on escalators, buses, trains etc and then eat crisps or sandwiches etc with the same hand without using a sanitizer or cloth etc to wash their hands.

We need public information campaigns to highlight the ever growing problem. There used to be TV and cinema and poster campaigns.

We make free condoms available, so why not provide free paper tissue packets or handkerchiefs or hand sanitizers??

I went on a cruise this Summer. It's been well publicised that there've been various issues on cruises over the last three years with D&V, novovirus, etc. On the cruise, there were hospital style hand sanitizers literally everywhere - every public area, entrance to every bar, every restaurant, etc. There were signs all over the ship reminding you to wash your hands regularly. There were cleaners who spent all day wiping the handrails on stairs, wiping the buttons in the lifts, etc. It was, to put it bluntly, "in your face", so people took it seriously because of the increased awareness and also because of the ease in actually being able to do it.

Like hospitals, there's lots of awareness now, posters everywhere, hand gel dispensers everywhere.

It needs to be highlighted. It's so easy to be a bit more responsible with personal hygiene, and wouldn't take much for the health authorities to improve publicity, accessibility, etc.