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Sep. 5--An emergency room overflow tent went up this week outside Memorial Medical Center in Modesto for the first time since H1N1, or swine flu, appeared in California, but a spokeswoman said the tent is not purely a reaction to the pandemic.

"It's a combination, a mixture of people coming in for different reasons," said Catherine Larsen, regional marketing director for the hospital's parent company, Sutter Health.

Memorial first put up the tent in late April when H1N1 was detected in the valley and used it for a few days as a waiting and triage area, where patients are screened for severity of illness or injury.

With more people seeking medical care in the past week or two and the long Labor Day weekend, Memorial officers "decided to be a little proactive," Larsen said.

"We're just getting prepared in case we need it." She acknowledged recent deaths involving the H1N1 virus in Stanislaus County, but said the hospital has not seen a spike in such cases in the past month.

The tent has electricity for computers and fans but no air conditioning.