Enlarged view of head lice

A quiet murmer is making the rounds among parents of Steinbach Junior High students as the incidence of lice in the school surfaced on Facebook last week.  A letter was sent home to all students of Steinbach Junior High with information about detection and treatment of the bug.

Hanover Assistant Superintendent Chris Gudziunas says each school has staff who are trained to spot lice.  "It's a good first line of defence.  There are always things teachers need to look for and (one of those) are signs or symptoms that there might be potential for lice.  Each school has a couple of people who have been trained in how to look and check for lice.  Then at the initial point, if someone does come to school with lice, we can identify it."

It appears there have been confirmed cases of lice at the Junior High and other schools in Steinbach. 

He says there is a detailed plan that is followed when lice is discovered in a school.  "We have a standard protocol that we have worked closely at developing with our local RHA.  If a case of head lice is found in a school, once confirmed, we contact the RHA and public health nurse right away.  Once the RHA gets involved, we defer to them and follow the instructions that they lay out for us in terms of what we need to do and how we need to deal with it.  The school will then isolate that person and send home a generic letter informing parents there has been a case and to keep an eye on it."

Gudziunas notes the letter they send home to parents has good information.  "It describes what lice is.  What treatment is used for head lice, the treatment procedure, what to do if there are nits that are found and how to remove those nits.  And if you have any further questions it asks you to contact your local public health nurse."

He notes once the RHA gets involved all the treatments are looked after.  "But we will continue to check and monitor so if the person comes back and maybe hasn't done all the treatment, we like to make sure we catch things and everything is done(properly)."

He says "This is kind of the season where lice can show up in our rinks and our churches and we try as best we can to make sure we are proactive and keep an eye on things so that it doesn't get to be a huge problem.  Once it gets cold and there's toques, scarves, mitts and kids are sharing things there is always that potential for the transmission of lice being brought in from somewhere."

Check back Thursday when we discuss this concern with Public Health Manager Bev Unger.