Study details here published in The Atlantic.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/schools-arent-superspreaders/616669/
It’s showing .13% in students and .24% among staff. And preliminary data isn’t showing big community spikes.
Time to reopen the schools. The kids are losing far too much for this to continue in the face of this data.
Is there any data on comparisons between how well school districts and colleges that had good plans in place faired (so far) relative to those who completely “reopened” schools? I’d be curious to see that. For example, I know some schools in Georgia were clusterfucks that had to be shut back down. Is that because they didn’t really have plans to prevent spread?
Also, universities are not fairing equally well. For example, UT Austin and Penn State appear to have a case rate of less than 3% of their population. However, Univ. of Georgia is closer to 10%.
All of that data is sortable using the hamburger menu within the data set (on the upper left). So you could compare, say, New Jersey hybrid with Georgia fully open schools from there.
Let’s look at University of Georgia then.
Well, what do ya know? Same pattern as everywhere else. Surveillance testing showing a quick rise to 9% positivity on the week ending 9/4 and a quick drop as well, dropping to under 4% within 2 weeks. Most recent report about 1%. In fact -
Total positive tests peaked at 1504, most recent 64.
Damn. So much for that example of failure.
And for what it is worth, a school being shut down for some period of time is not failure. It is a conservative approach to help assure that a school flare (and I cannot imagine that there would be none happening anywhere) does not trigger a community wide one.
This didn’t answer my question. I used certain universities as examples, but is there a publication (or at least pre-print) that looked at different mitigation strategies and compared it to number of cases. UT performed significantly better than UG in both student and faculty/staff case rates per population. Did they have different plans in place?
The same question holds for K-12. Obviously fully remote learning will be superior in keeping cases low but what about districts that went hybrid or fully F2F? Is there a publication that compares their strategies?
This is the kind of data I’d like to look at but it looks like the results are from survey.(?) I don’t know where the data is coming from. Ideally, I’d like to see an actual publication from someone analyzing and interpreting the data. Perhaps it’s too early, but without this information, we can’t tell what is working.
I would like to find too.
Speaking of Georgia, the schools backed down on the idea of reporting their numbers, citing privacy reasons. Still though there are reports coming from the groups the schools are reporting to.
The Good news is that numbers are going down, but outbreaks are happening in schools.
These outbreaks are occurring in settings where people are physically congregating and underscore the need for physical distancing and source control. The highest number of outbreaks occurred in schools, long-term care facilities, correctional facilities and workplaces.
Schools fueling new COVID-19 outbreaks in Georgia, state reports show
State reports have shown a rapid rise in school outbreaks since the start of the month.
As @MandaJo has pointed out in the past, one really has to make comparisons across schools and from schools to communities with great caution as testing protocols vary greatly between them. The comparisons are most valid within the same program over time.
That caveat duly noted let’s look at University of Texas at Austin, your stated “significantly better” performance example some …
First, damn that same pattern hits again! Rapid peak also and rapid drop and never any big spread into faculty. Highest number of 114 new positives on 9/11, latest of 2.
“Proactive screening” has ranged mostly between 1 and 3%; now a bit under 1%. 7 day rolling average positivity rate of clinical testing of students based on symptoms and contact tracing of close contacts peaked 9/9 at 21.4% and most recent 4.3%. That 21.4% means that they likely missed a bunch of infections then.
Both currently have a surveillance/proactive screening rate of around 1%. UG has a very very low hospitalization rate but I cannot find any number to compare to at UT. Neither has much in their surrounding communities. Pretty much by those metrics both are doing quite well.
The only difference that might be real is the size of their respective surveillance/proactive testing peaks, even though both were similarly brief spikes and both have quickly come down to the same levels.
Looking online I don’t find too much difference in their plans and approaches: UG’s or UT’s.
If I had to guess it is more the behavior of the students outside of classes and dorms that played a role there. FWIW 26% of UG students are in the Greek system and only 14% of UT /Austin’s are.
Let’s be clear what that report says. Definition of outbreak, per that report:
Meanwhile have those incidences of two or more (students or staff) within 14 days within the school had any impact on community rates?
So, no.
As pointed before, others already made the point that the situation can change quickly. As reported, the highest number of outbreaks occurred in schools, so I do hope that this will indeed not impact community rates when there are (I hope too) more testing, masks and contact tracing. Remember, we are still under very lousy leadership/efforts in many places of the USA still.
I doubt you’ll find a different trend at any college or university that had the same start date. I’m talking about the temporal relationship, I’m talking about total numbers per capita and positivity rates. UT’s “surveillance or proactive” positivity rate peaked at less than 4%, UG was more than double that. UG didn’t post all the surveillance testing on faculty and staff but UT’s positivity rates nonexistent. UT’s daily new cases and total cases were less than 1/3 per capita than UG’s. I’m not saying UG failed miserably but UT performed better overall. As an aside, UG’s data reporting format is not very good.
So again, I’m not asking anyone here for their opinion on the data. I’m asking if anyone has seen an actual study comparing universities. A quick glance at the links shows that UT’s website regarding covid-19 is easier to navigate. Perhaps students received more detailed and explicit instructions. That’s what I want to know from a study.
Yes, lousy leadership. Agreed. And immaterial.
Georgia mid-August was with a background transmission rate that few (certainly not me) would have thought reasonable to open up schools at. Yet still rates dropped over the weeks after they did open up, even there, and in communities doing so much else wrong. It’s something like six weeks after schools opened there, enough time to have had those “outbreaks” in the schools … is it, by definition, a result of schools opening whenever the rate changes to moving upward? Because it would be very shocking for rates to not go up again sometime.
I know that it is very difficult to prove that Santa Claus does not exist, and similarly hard to prove that there opening schools is not a huge risk to the community or to the teachers. So far though, from the very start of this thread back in May, every single thing that would have been expected to be seen if kids were significant drivers of community infection or big risks to teachers and staff has failed to occur, and every thing that would have been expected if they are not has happened. Is there a point when those who posit that opening is inherently unsafe are expected to bring any evidence that supports the claim other than that which demonstrates that it is not impossible for it to happen, any more than it is not impossible that Santa just is not hiding really well?
I’ve not. Nor would I expect to see one, nor personally care. Comparing surveillance numbers is silly as I highly doubt each use the same methods. The “better” was a number for all of a week or so of little meaningful significance.
To the question about whether colleges and universities can open up without causing huge infection rates within at risk staff and faculty and in their communities, to the claim made by some that opening up college campuses to students living on campuses was a big mistake that would lead to huge disasters across the country, forget going to college young folk … it seems like they can even in the places widely thought of having done it wrong and having significant initial surges as a result. The surges seem to pretty consistently drop back down with few significantly ill in their wakes. Doubt that would have been as good of an outcome with these 18 to 22 year olds going to bars and parties with each other while living at home with their parents and grandparents …
Did you hear this pattern predicted widely? I didn’t. Either hear it or predict it.
For that matter other than here are you hearing about it much elsewhere?
I know it is difficult to believe, but you are straw manning again. Read it again, I’m concentrating on the teachers and staff not on the already acknowledged less infectious kids. While it is welcome that the numbers are not as bad as some expected, it is very cavalier indeed to ignore how inadequate are the levels of PPE, upgrade of installations, testing, etc, is for many districts.
Teachers and staff are not blind to that, and really, the ones that ignore that do believe in Santa. The lack of leadership then is material.
“Overall, there was just this utter disrespect for teachers and their lives,” she said. “We’re expected to be going back with so little.” When school leaders said teachers would be “going back in-person, full throttle, that’s when I said, ‘I’m not doing it. No.’”
Teachers in at least three states have died after bouts with the coronavirus since the start of the new school year. It’s unclear how many teachers in the U.S. have become ill with COVID-19, but Mississippi alone reported 604 cases among teachers and staff.
In cases where teachers are exposed to the virus, they could face pressure to return to the classroom. The Trump administration has declared teachers to be “critical infrastructure workers” in guidance that could give the green light to exempting them from quarantine requirements.
Throughout Indiana, more than 600 teacher retirements have been submitted since July, according to state data. Although the state gets most of its teacher retirements during the summer, surveys suggest more retirements than usual could happen as the calendar year progresses, said Trish Whitcomb, executive director of the Indiana Retired Teachers Association.
“I’ve gotten more (teachers) calling me back saying, ‘Well, I’m going to go ahead and retire,’” Whitcomb said. “Some still wanted to go back in the classroom, but they didn’t think the risk was worth it. They looked at their grandkids and the life they have, and I think they’re saying, ‘I’m just not going to do it.’”
In Salt Lake County, Utah, the state’s most populated metropolitan area, more than 80 teachers have either resigned or retired early because of concerns about COVID-19 in schools. More than half of those happened in one of the county’s five school districts, Granite School District. All of the district’s teachers who left were fined $1,000 for failing to give 30 days’ notice.
Mike McDonough, president of the Granite Education Association teachers union, said the departures stem from frustration over how the schools have reopened. In Granite, most students will return to in-person instruction for four days a week, and there are few opportunities for teachers to instruct solely online.
Some teachers waited until the last minute, hoping that the district would change its reopening plan. But checking out of the classroom was “the only way to keep themselves safe,” he said.
“Teachers are still scared and overwhelmed,” McDonough said. “I have heard from teachers that are just heartbroken to leave the classroom, but they didn’t feel safe going back. They don’t want that level of risk, and they have no other choice but to get out.”
Education leaders in states including Arizona, Kansas, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Texas have said they are bracing for worsening teacher shortages as the pandemic drives away some educators.
So let me make sure I have this right:
Discussing the continued persistent lack of any evidence emerging that supports the hypotheses that opening schools means elevated risk to the community as a whole or to teachers/staff is “straw manning”.
What matters is that teachers have been convinced that they should be very very afraid, not what the actual risks are.
No one here defends cavalier approaches to mitigation. In schools or anywhere else. That said what PPE other than masks do you believe are required and absent? Is there at this point any evidence to support the position that teachers and staff are at higher risk than other adults doing most other jobs in their communities? Or is that perception more driven by misleading headlines, like the one above about schools “fueling outbreaks”, when the article reveals that no community outbreaks are occurring from schools and that “outbreaks” means just more than one teacher, staff, or student with an infection in a school within 14 days who may be epidemiologically linked?
After reading about a lot of under 18 cases here in NH over the past week I decided to compare the numbers to early August, back before any NH kids returned to school.
The week of August 4-12 there were a total of 204 cases in NH. 3 of these were children, so 1.48% of cases.
In the past week there have been 488 cases in NH. 77 of these were children, so 15.78% of cases.
I hope we begin to trend down again soon.
Georgia isn’t close to being opened up and they keep closing schools that do open due to outbreaks. Some remote areas are saying fuck it all and opening up, but the metro areas are for the most part far more cautious.
School districts in the metro Atlanta area (where the majority of Georgians live):
Even when they allow full face to face, all of the above counties are offering remote options for parents who choose that route (they are typically asking parents to decide remote or face-to-face for each semester as a whole, versus changing their minds mid-stream). I don’t know the numbers for all schools, but my wife estimates that she has about a 40% face to face versus 60% remote split at this time (middle school).
So no, it’s not like 6 weeks after schools opened there.
It is because I was not talking about the item that was already acknowledged many times by me before. Many times I agree that elementary and even middle schoolers should not worry much about spreading the disease. the problem is that kids are not going to school alone, teachers and staff increase their risks. Dismiss all the dangers teachers and staffers are seeing, and then we see what is happening. My experience with social studies and history came forth and told me what would happen when less help or inadequate supplies or testing was still there in the USA. Many teachers retire early and cause more disruptions, and some of them will pay the ultimate price to make bad leadership happy.
Boston delayed plans to reopen schools in the city because the coronavirus positivity rate hit 4%, Mayor Marty Walsh announced Wednesday. But the 1,300 highest-need students, who already returned to class last week, will continue with in-person learning if their parents so choose.
The union, which held an emergency town hall Wednesday night, said in a statement it was headed to court for the injunction, claiming the city isn’t standing by an agreement to move to full remote learning now that the coronavirus infection rate is above 4%.
Here in Arizona it is clear that a poor district I work for in IT has reported that they will not be able to comply with the requirements for full re-openings if there is no more help available. The other one, a public charter school that serves a poor area may have to close. Both have been doing the recommended hybrid or remote teaching. Several benchmarks for a full opening were there, but the number of infections is increasing so we are still not opening fully in almost all counties, but the Governor, is encouraging districts to open, some with more recurses are doing so. But if this was a war, as some leaders like to compare it, some leaders are encouraging their “soldiers” to go over the top armed with wooden bayonets against Covid.
There is still a lot of the fog of war too. In another failure of leadership that we are seeing, a lot of why many teachers and staffers are reacting that way is caused by the lack of leadership that you still think is immaterial.
https://www.actionnewsnow.com/content/national/572712151.html?ref=151
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a study in late September saying that the incidence of Covid-19 among younger children appears to be much lower than in adolescents, which could give confidence that elementary schools, in particular, are safer to reopen.
But there hasn’t yet been a chance to study that.
Instead the anecdotes continue. Many remember the widely shared photos of crowded hallways as school started in Paulding County, Georgia, that were followed by cases of coronavirus and hundreds of students and staff in quarantine.
But for the majority of schools that have opened their doors, infection rates and case counts have not skyrocketed as much as medical professionals, teachers, and parents feared.
Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, said that could have been a cause for celebration if anyone had been tracking the situation effectively.
“Some schools opened well and fine, without transmission of illness and that would have created great confidence,” Weingarten told CNN. “But instead of having a great national celebration about any of this stuff, everybody’s just completely on edge and anxious about what’s going to happen because there’s no national guidance.”
The problematic openings could even have helped others, Weingarten said. “I think that the Georgia … situation, where you saw a huge number of kids running through those halls in the middle of real community spread, scared people enough to do masks and physical distancing.”
Part of what has led to a safe reopening, experts say, is only introducing in-person learning when there is a relatively low community spread of coronavirus.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said at the Texas Tribune Festival in late September “you’ve got to look at the relative risk to the children in the particular area, county, city, state, that you happen to live” when determining when to bring children back to school.
But of course students are only part of the equation. Teachers need to go to school as well and for Karen Ngosso, a third-grade teacher in Baltimore, the time is not right.
She says she’s seeing almost all of her 42 students at Hazelwood Elementary log on to lessons and she stresses everyone is doing what they can to give the children a high-quality education.
And until there is a vaccine against Covid-19, Ngosso said she is not comfortable returning to teaching in person.
“I know how I’m handling the pandemic, and how I’m following the protocols with myself and my children and the people that come into my space, but I can’t control what anybody else does out in this whole big wide world, and people are moving and traveling and doing different things. And some people are like, it’s nothing,” she said.
“I don’t want to be a guinea pig. I don’t want to be a petri dish,” she added. “People really have to understand that just because I’m a teacher doesn’t mean I stopped being a human.”
Okay.
So this is what I am asking for actual evidence for. Not anecdotes that continue. So far, as seen in this thread earlier, the evidence has not shown teachers and staff working in at-person schools at higher risk than other adults in their communities working other typical jobs. If anything they seem to be at less risk.
I do not debate that some teachers are more afraid to return than are many other workers.
Uh, the article makes the point that arguments like yours are the anecdote. You are still missing that I approach this from the social studies angle, I was correct about how leadership matters on things like in a pandemic.
And in the end you do not debate teachers alright, you ignore that in many places in the US (and Israel) that there are elements that grossly dismiss the risks (and people that while they do not dismiss the risks they are ignoring that there are people that are teachers, parents and students too that are making it worse for others) that only make the situation worse or as the data shows, keep the pandemic going at a steady level, ready to make it worse.