After last year’s H1N1 pandemic on campuses, University Campus Health Services is making use of an increased supply of vaccines to keep students flu free. Jeff Dimond, spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said 160 million flu vaccines were produced for this flu season nationwide, which is a record amount.

With a stack of Valentine cards ready for addressing, nurse Fran Whitfield passed the time in Lenoir Hall last week on the off chance that someone might stop by for an H1N1 vaccine.

Her continuing education reading sat out on the table, and two scrawled pages of the beginning of a manuscript were held down with a bottle of hand sanitizer.

Health officials are still urging students to get vaccinated for H1N1, even though the number of cases has significantly declined since fall’s peak.

Although it hasn’t yet materialized, another wave of the flu could happen, and there is currently a surplus of vaccines, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

After a month-long struggle, freshman Lillian Claire Chason died Dec. 16 at UNC Hospitals from acute respiratory distress syndrome.

Chason had fallen ill shortly before Thanksgiving with pneumonia, which doctors suspected to have been caused by the H1N1 virus.

Lillian Chason, a freshman who spent the last several weeks battling complications from the H1N1 virus, died Wednesday afternoon, her father reported on Facebook.

A blood drive will be held Tuesday for a freshman who has spent more than two weeks on life support at UNC Hospitals for complications from the H1N1 virus.

Give blood

Time: 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Tuesday

Place: In front of the Student Union

Register for the blood drive here.

This article was published in the 2009 Year in Review issue of The Daily Tar Heel.

2009: The year of the swine.

Prevention has been one of the key goals of UNC Campus Health Services in dealing with the H1N1 virus, commonly known as swine flu. Health officials hope those precautions will be enough when students return next semester.

This holiday season, some might be forced to spend time away from home while they or their loved ones receive treatment at UNC Hospitals.

That’s when the State Employees’ Credit Union Family House provides a refuge for families like Robert McRae’s.

The Family House provides a place for out-of-towners to stay when recovering or when someone in their family is hospitalized.

Vaccines aren’t cool these days — at least that’s how many young people seem to feel. A recent ABC-Washington Post poll reports that only 28 percent of respondents ages 18 to 24 plan to get the H1N1 vaccine, a lower percentage than older age groups.

The University has ordered enough H1N1 vaccines for everyone on campus who wants them, but administrators have been surprised by low demand.

Campus Health Services ordered about 28,000 H1N1 vaccinations in October for every student, staff member, faculty member and hospital patient at the University, but only slightly more than 20 percent have been administered.

A mutation in the H1N1 virus is making it harder for health officials to treat patients with the flu.

Three of the four patients infected with the mutated virus at Duke University Medical Center died Friday.

Doctors are worried because the mutated virus is resistant to Tamiflu, the main drug used to treat the flu.

After months of panic about swine flu, the tables have turned. The pigs at the N.C. State Fair now have to worry about catching their own virus.

The fair, which opens today, will be home to hundreds of pigs and fair officials are worried about not only the spread of the virus from human to human, but from human to pig and other livestock.

There will be more than 6,000 livestock at the fair.

Those wanting the newly arrived swine flu vaccine might have to wait a little longer.

The Orange County Health Department received 700 doses of H1N1 nasal mist vaccine last week, but they will not distribute them until Friday.

The UNC campus has yet to receive its shipments.

No more children can tour the living quarters of the fire station unless they’re already scheduled to do so.

The Chapel Hill Fire Department has joined the ranks of local organizations openly uneasy about H1N1.

Spokeswoman Lisa Edwards released a statement Thursday detailing precautionary efforts regarding the department’s public education program.

Public education events will be honored if already arranged, but will be modified to prevent the spread of H1N1, commonly known as swine flu.

As the number of H1N1 cases at universities increases, Duke University is using a new diagnostic method to study the spread of viruses — testing sick students and paying them for their time.

Researchers are studying 500 to 800 freshman students living on the East Campus of Duke University to observe how respiratory viral infections, such as H1N1, spread in closed communities and how to identify sicknesses before the symptoms appear.

As the University attempts to cope with a spreading H1N1 virus and considers new rules on how to prevent it, officials are finding that tracing the virus is more difficult than they thought.

While UNC recorded its first case on May 29, the exact number of infected persons to date remains a mystery even to Campus Health Services officials.

“Nobody would be able to say with certainty because employees have different health care providers, and the way people are being tested and treated kept changing throughout the summer,” said Mike McFarland, UNC spokesman.

As students return to campus, University officials are preparing for a possible H1N1 flu outbreak.

Officials sent out new guidelines to students and staff in a mass e-mail Wednesday and have been working on a pandemic readiness plan for the campus.

The plan consists of four levels, with the highest calling for the University to shut down — an unlikely scenario as of yet.

Right now the University is at level one, which signifies a low level of risk for the community.