San Antonio \u2013 A San Antonio-area doctor tells us that an average healthy kid can get sick up to six times during the winter months, because viruses tend to thrive in colder weather. <\/p>\n
Pediatrician Oziel Ortiz with Baptist Health System says there\u2019s an influx of hospitalizations of kids who have underlying conditions and end up catching the flu or a cold. He says the number of sick children is much higher; they don\u2019t make it to urgent care or a hospital for testing. <\/p>\n
\u201cViruses do a little bit better during the winter in the context of the environment, the air is a little bit drier, which allows somebody\u2019s droplets to hang out a little bit more in the air. That\u2019s probably issue number one. Issue number two, in the content of community, we have more gatherings. And so we get a little closer to people. Our immune system doesn\u2019t work as well through the winter. So that\u2019s why we see a little bit more of these viruses through the winter,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
The illnesses also affect school attendance. Anecdotally, some school district leaders say they see more classroom absences in January and February. <\/p>\n
Three area school districts shared some of their data with KSAT, showing the average attendance in January and February \u2014 those numbers show a slight drop in attendance.<\/p>\n
A breakdown of the attendance data can be viewed below.<\/p>\n
San Antonio Independent School District<\/p>\n
2023 <\/p>\n
January: 88%<\/p>\n
February: 89.4%<\/p>\n
March: 89.2%<\/p>\n
2024<\/p>\n
January: 87%<\/p>\n
February: 88.2%<\/p>\n
March: 89.6%<\/p>\n
North East Independent School District<\/p>\n
2023<\/p>\n
January: 90.7%<\/p>\n
February: 92.9%<\/p>\n
March: 93.2%<\/p>\n
2024<\/p>\n
January: 91.9%<\/p>\n
February: 93%<\/p>\n
March: 93.5%<\/p>\n
Comal Independent School District (the district only shared 2024 numbers)<\/p>\n
2024<\/p>\n
January: 94.3%<\/p>\n
February: 93.53%<\/p>\n
March: 94.27%<\/p>\n
Ortiz says teachers can do their part by keeping sanitizing wipes and spray on hand and using them in commonly used spaces, such as tables and counters. <\/p>\n
He says using an alcohol based hand sanitizer before the kids enter the classroom and when they leave could also help. <\/p>\n
Parents are encouraged to remind kids to practice good hygiene, such as washing their hands and covering their coughs or sneezes. <\/p>\n
Read more:<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"San Antonio \u2013 A San Antonio-area doctor tells us that an average healthy kid can get sick up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[51099,8109,163,584,6527,22693,4042,82,84,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-125726","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-baptist-health-system","9":"tag-comal-isd","10":"tag-education","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-ksatkids","13":"tag-neisd","14":"tag-saisd","15":"tag-san-antonio","16":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","17":"tag-san-antonio-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}