Valley man may have died from flu

MEADOW LAKES -- Flu season in the Valley might be a greater cause for concern than many residents believe.

A stern warning to sickness-prone Valley residents was issued Dec. 13 when Michael Schroeder, 29, was found dead of the flu in his Meadow Lakes cabin home. Schroeder had been showing signs of illness since Thanksgiving, but he and his family initially dismissed the symptoms as the possible return of a severe stomach infection and a common cold.

"His immune system had been compromised earlier this year," Donnita Burks, Schroeder's mother, said Friday. "But he was 29 years old. There's no reason for him to be dead, but he is." Burks also stated that Schroeder did not seek medical attention over the course of his illness.

At the time of his bout with the virus, Schroeder had been working at the cash register at Schuck's Auto Supply on the Parks Highway. Burks believes that he might have originally contracted his illness from handling customers' money at the register.

The precise date of Schroeder's death is not known; he lived alone at the cabin, and was not found for several days afterward. Burks said she called her son on the Wednesday before he was found, but received no answer. "I figured he was at work," she said. Friends, Lee and Gi Rose, were the first to discover him in his small cabin on Johnson Road in Meadow Lakes, and Burks was notified immediately after.

The Alaska State Medical Examiner's office was unable to determine Schroeder's cause of death with complete certainty since the body was delivered more than 24 hours after death, Burks said. Dr. Susan Klingler, who classified the incident as "probable viral death," reportedly told Burks she was certain that influenza was to blame. Calls to the Medical Examiner's office for verification were not returned as of press time.

Ironically, when Burks called some of her friends and relatives to inform them of her son's death, she found many of them absent from their workplaces, bedridden with the flu. Last week Dr. Beth Funk, a medical epidemiologist with the Alaska Divison of Public Health, said 157 cases of flu had been reported in Anchorage and the Mat-Su, reflecting the number of reported cases based on tests performed by area hospitals. Many people, however, are not tested -- like Schroeder. His death is by far the most dire Valley case that may be attributed to the illness thus far.

Burks sees this incident as a strong sign that Valley residents should not take the ongoing flu season lightly. "Michael was always helping people, putting others before himself," she said. "He would want people to know about this."