Districts disinfect schools following norovirus outbreak

EUREKA – School districts are cleaning up after highly contagious norovirus forced many to close their doors to prevent further spread.
The outbreak started at South Bay Union School District in mid-December forcing all three campuses to close. Eureka City Schools was next, closing two days before the scheduled holiday break.
A total of 22 schools from Fieldbrook to Fortuna shut their doors to keep large groups of students from infecting each other.
Because norovirus can live on surfaces for days or even weeks custodial staff at Eureka City Schools are following recommendations from the Department of Public Health to clean campuses.
Superintendent Fred Van Vleck said that while there are no guarantees the district is doing everything it can to sanitize schools.
District Superintendent Fred Van Vleck said, “What it involves is a lot of bleach and going around the classrooms and anywhere and everywhere that students touch and then even going so far as when we leave the classroom do a misting of bleach water of the entire classroom surfaces and letting those sit for a time to do everything we can to make sure that the norovirus is killed if there is any inside each of the classrooms.”
Van Vleck said they will be monitoring attendance closely to watch for any additional norovirus cases. Classes are scheduled to resume Monday.