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 In Washington, D.C., all staff and 51,000 public school students
must upload a negative test result to the district's website before
coming to class on Wednesday. Tests administered before Tuesday will
not be accepted. Parents can pick up rapid tests at their school or
use their own.
Similar efforts are underway in California, which pledged to provide
free home-test kits to all its 6 million K-12 public school
students.
"There's a lot of COVID out there ... it's going to be a bumpy
start," said Michelle Smith McDonald, director of communications and
public affairs for the Alameda County Office of Education.
New COVID cases have hit record levels https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-maps/countries-and-territories/united-states
of 400,000 new infections a day on average due to the extremely
transmissible nature of the Omicron variant. Health experts predict
even more people will test positive following holiday gatherings,
leading to millions of people in quarantine and isolation in the
coming weeks.
Schools from Massachusetts to Michigan to Washington state were
delaying classes a few days and asking students and staff to use
that time to get tested for COVID.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has said shutting schools in the
state should be only a last resort. But school administrators are
worried about having enough teachers and other staff.
"There will probably be individual school closures, whether due to
an outbreak, or not enough staff," McDonald said.
In line with updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC), the state has shortened its quarantine period
for those exposed to someone with COVID or testing positive for
COVID to five days from 10.
Scientists and health experts are concerned https://www.reuters.com/world/us/no-tests-no-problem-experts-question-new-us-cdc-policy-covid-isolation-period-2021-12-29
the policy fails to distinguish between vaccinated and unvaccinated
people, who recover from the virus at different rates. It also does
not require testing to confirm that a person is no longer infectious
before they end their quarantine.
California has recommended people have a negative COVID test before
leaving isolation. Other states such as Illinois https://twitter.com/ISBEnews
have not adopted the new CDC guidelines.
[to top of second column] |
 Asked about the confusion
around testing, top U.S. infectious disease
expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said
https://www.reuters.com/business/
ealthcare-pharmaceuticals/fauci-warns-danger-hospitalization-surge-due-large-number-covid-cases-2022-01-02
on Sunday that the CDC will soon clarify whether
people with COVID-19 should test negative to
leave isolation.
The extent of the Omicron surge on the country's
school districts probably will not be clear
until next week. Already parents and
administrators are struggling to implement
changing guidance and figure out how many shots
staff and older teenage students need to be
considered fully vaccinated. This is the third
school year disrupted by COVID, which has not
only set students back academically but socially
as well.
While early data suggests Omicron is less severe
than previous coronavirus variants, Fauci warned
hospitalizations could surge because of how
quickly it spreads. In just over
three weeks, the number of hospitalized COVID patients rose 50%
nationwide and COVID hospitalizations are at 70% of the previous
peak in January 2021, according to a Reuters tally. Delaware,
Maryland, Ohio and Washington, D.C., have more COVID patients
hospitalized than at any other point in the pandemic. Delaware and
Ohio have sent National Guard troops to hospitals to try to help
with the surge.
New York City schools, the largest district in the country, are
reopening as planned on Monday but with more testing for its nearly
1 million students. And instead of quarantining an entire classroom
if one person tests positive, all students in the class will be
given rapid at-home tests to use over the next seven days.
New York City Major Eric Adams told parents to "fear not" as they
sent their children back to school.
"The safest place for children is inside a school. The number of
transmissions is low," he told ABC's "This Week" on Sunday.
(Reporting by Ann Saphir in San Francisco and Joe Shaw in
Washington; Writing by Lisa Shumaker; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
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