Letter to the editor

The recent meningitis conflict at Linfield highlights several shortcomings of the Linfield Administration’s approach toward ensuring the public health of both the faculty and the student body.

The Linfield Review was ultimately the one to release the name of the infected student, and only after a series of vague emails from the administration that resulted in over 400 students rushing to the Student Health center out of fear for the unknown chance of infection.

At a small residential campus like Linfield, the threat of infectious disease is high. When that threat is coupled with the severity of meningitis, fear escalates.

It is not only the administration’s job to quell the public health threat, which by all standards was appropriate, but it is also the job of the administration to adequately inform the students and faculty of the risk on campus.

Although bound by law, by not releasing the name of the student the administration indirectly propelled the mystery of the conflict.

This mystery must be met with information pertaining to the risk involved. It was not.

An accusation of Linfield’s lack of concern for the student body would be unfounded, however.

The point at issue here is not one of a degree of concern, but rather a failure to inform the population of the threat involved.

The fulcrum to the administrations folly, while perhaps unintentional, hinged on the “informative” emails sent out, which consisted of a list of symptoms such as “nausea,” “headache,” and “fever,” each of which is quite common and subject to consideration.

What was not initially included was a description of the way meningitis is transmitted, the likelihood of contraction, or a timetable of the disease.

While releasing the name of the student may have helped some dismiss the the possibility of infection, it was not ultimately necessary to fulfill the informative role of the administration.

By being both uninformative and vague, the emails ran contrary to this end, and served to increase fear instead.

The severity of the disease may not be understood by many, but it was understood by the administration.

They went to great lengths to contact the appropriate agencies in response to the infection, but they did not present that effort to the student body.

At the health screening the two questions students were immediately asked were if you were on the football team and if you went to a party at some address.

If only the administration included more information in the emails, less students would have felt the need to go to the screening.

Hopefully this serves as a learning experience for the administration.

-Rachael Gernhardt, ’16