Oregon Public Broadcasting

Tuesday, classes start in many school districts. The schools are planning how they'll react when large numbers of students come down with the H1N1 virus. Correspondent Doug Nadvornick reports.

Cynthia Taggart from the Idaho Panhandle Health District says the appearance of H1N1 in Northwest schools is inevitable. She says that, within a week or two of children returning to class, kids are going to catch the flu and pass it to their friends.

Cynthia Taggart: "They're going to share things. They're going to shake hands. They're going to grab each other. They're going to blow in each others' faces. I mean, kids do things like that."

Taggart says her health district is asking schools and parents for specific information to help them track the flu.

Cynthia Taggart: "When they call in to say their child is ill to tell them if they have respiratory symptoms."

Melanie Rose from the Central Valley School District in Spokane says her district is going one step farther.

Melanie Rose: "We're going to attempt to track staff illness. Teachers get sick along with kids and we have never tracked the reason why teachers are sick, just that they are."

For some districts, the worst may not come. The Spokane School District says classes have been underway for a week-and-a-half. So far, it hasn't seen unusually high numbers of flu cases.