Student Health Services operations manager Margaret Perley confirmed the H1N1 flu strain was in the student community, and the number of flu-related calls and visits was up significantly, compared with last week.
On Monday, 150 students complaining of flu-like symptoms contacted Student Health either in person or by phone, compared with the 90 a day who contacted the service late last week.
Student Health was operating on the "strong assumption" most flu cases probably involved H1N1, and those suspected of having flu-like symptoms were given masks and asked to wait in a separate area. To avoid pressure on the service, students were asked to phone a nurse, who would decide if a doctor needed to see them.
"Winter is a time of higher levels of sickness. Currently, this is tracking along predicted lines. However, what has changed in the last few days is that the percentage of unwell students with influenza symptoms has started to rise rapidly," Ms Perley said.
In an effort to control the spread of swine flu, students are asked to keep themselves healthy and warm, practise "social distancing", and use hand sanitisers located around the university.
Students with pre-existing medical conditions were at risk, as well as those living in cold flats and who get run down from poor diet or lack of sleep.
To stop the spread of the virus, students with flu-like symptoms were advised to stay at home and not attend lectures, to rest, keep up their fluids and use paracetamol for fever and aches. Students should advise people around them that they were not well, and if people become concerned over their illness they should ring Student Health, she said.
The rise in student illness numbers has coincided with increased fears in the community about swine flu, despite the repeated messages about it generally being a mild disease, Balclutha general practitioner Dr Branko Sijnja said yesterday.
He told the Otago and Southland district health board community and public health committee meeting that there was much talk about the deaths from the virus.
Regional clinical adviser for community services Dr Roy Morris said reports from all practices, collated by primary health organisations on the incidence of consultations for influenza-like illness, showed GPs had an increased workload, but at this stage doctors were coping with it.
Yesterday, there were 2443 confirmed cases of swine flu, up from 2368 the previous day.
The number of deaths related to the illness is 11. The latest death was a child in the Mid Central District Health Board region who had underlying medical conditions and died within the past week.
Yesterday, none of the 26 confirmed cases in intensive care was in Otago or Southland.
The Ministry of Health advised yesterday that the most up-to-date figures available on deaths related to seasonal influenza were from 2006, when the total number of seasonal influenza-related deaths, including pneumonia, was 479, and the number of influenza-related deaths between April and the end of June was 107.
