Nov. 4, 2005 Vol. 35 Issue 3
tiger print
BV Bands Local bands make big impression. See more on page 10.
Blue Valley High School
Avian flu poses threat
Ready to rumble... At the BV vs. BV West game last Friday, students arrived hours in advance to tailgate and show their support.
Analysts believe Avian flu could become the next big pandemic ellen thomas
opinions editor
W
emily kuykendall
Sophomore William Steinwart throws a football in the parking lot before the West game on Oct. 28. Middle: BV students tailgate by their trucks. Top right: Junior Nathaniel Chastain hangs the effigy of a Jaguar. The Tigers defeated West in a 41-13 victory. For more on sports, see pages 12-15.
Tiger Fest finds warm welcome Over $100,000 donated for silent auction to help keep activities, sports jessica katzenstein news editor
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condo in Maui. A Chiefs’ football signed by Dante Hall. Four tickets, backstage passes and plane tickets to According to Jim. All are up for auction at Blue Valley’s first annual Tiger Fest, Nov. 19 at 5-9 p.m. in the gym and the commons. Tiger Fest is a fund-raising activity for 30 participating BV clubs and sports. Parents and students in each activity solicited donations from businesses. The 900 donations — from 521 donors, 316 of which are businesses — will be auctioned off for profit. Five percent of each activity’s proceeds go to the ParentTeacher Organization for next year’s Tiger Fest. Donated items range in market value from $8 to $2000 and have a collective market
value of over $110,000. Bidder registration for the event is $7 in advance and $8 at the door. Only people over age 21 may participate in the auction. “Kids are definitely invited, though,” Tiger Fest chairperson Lynn Brown said. “They can come to dinner, walk around the gym and see the items.” The marching band, orchestra and choir will play all night; Jose Pepper’s and Cactus Grill will contribute dinner, which is covered by the entrance fee. The Future Business Leaders of America Club will provide a coffee bar. Foreign language students will provide desserts. As of Oct. 26, nearly 200 bidders had registered. “We’re really excited,” Brown said. “This is big.” Almost 30 parents helped organize Tiger Fest.
andrew robinson Freshman Alex Robinson prepares a basket for Tiger Fest as part of the marching band. Each section of the band was required to put together a basket to donate for Tiger Fest.
aking up in the morning, he feels tired. Everything aches. His nose is running, and he just keeps on coughing. Just thinking about getting out of bed makes him nauseous. His parents come in and notice that he has a very high fever. They immediately rush him to the hospital. Doctors discover that he has Avian flu. In a press conference on Tueday, President George Bush proposed a $7.1 billion plan to help prevent the Avian flu. The money will go to increase vaccine production and research new vaccination methods. Bush also stressed detection as the first defense to prevent the flu. While only a few human-to-human transmissions have been reported, the threat of a worldwide outbreak is real. All over Asia and now in Europe, the Avian flu has been causing bird farmers and other humans in contact with the infected birds to get sick with the potentially deadly disease. So far, 61 people have died in Asia from Avian flu since 2003. “[The Avian flu] is a strain of the flu that’s been seen mostly in Asia,” school nurse Barb Cecil said. “They expect it to be deadly, but right now all the cases have been from “This strain of Avian flu contact with the animals,” People who get the can kill quickly and jump flu have severe flu-like from birds to humans.” symptoms, simliar to a person with influenza, only worse, according to Cecil. Symptoms usually include cough, fever, sore throat and aches. Sometimes a patient can have eye infections or pneumonia as well. What also makes this disease so frightening to health workers, besides the threat of a pandemic, is the prevention methods. The vaccine is not widely available to those infected with the virus due to the lack of production. “They have a vaccine, but they are having a hard time mass producing it and getting it out to the public,” biology teacher Larry Hare said. This strain of the Avian flu can kill quickly and jump from birds to humans. So far, only a few cases of the bird flu have been reported where the victim has caught it from another human. Every so many years, the world experiences a worldwide outbreak of a disease that can kill millions. The world has not experienced a pandemic for over 50 years, causing various health experts from the United Nations, the European Union, the World Health Organization and various other health organizations around the world to worry about the outbreak that will happen in the future. The Spanish flu of 1918, the last major pandemic, killed between 50 to 100 million people. Nearly everyone on earth was exposed, and half got sick with the flu. It is suspected that a strain of bird flu started the outbreak. A United Nations health official said that a flu pandemic now could kill five to 150 million people. “President Bush has a committee and some pharmaceutical companies increasing the production of the vaccines to be ready,” Hare said. “They are also trying to make people aware that it can be transferred from bird to human.” If there were to be an outbreak in the school district, the state would be responsible for vaccinating the population and taking other precautions. “[The state] would be looking more for the very old and the very young for vaccinations,” Cecil said. “Hopefully, a teenager would be able to fight it and be okay.”