# Surge among kids when they go back to school **URL:** \ **Category:** The Quarantine Zone\ **Tags:** covid-quarantine\ **Created:** [July 26, 2021, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339 "2021-07-26T15:45:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/21 "2021-07-28T14:32:03Z")
Your experience as an actuary or talking to your friends?😋 ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/22 "2021-07-28T14:49:16Z")
Talking to my friends. I’m not a health actuary. But i thought it was common knowledge that parents of little kids get sick all the time, and I’m surprised if anyone has other experience. I mean, even if they don’t get sick, they get exposed to everything their kids are exposed to. 🤷‍♀️ ---
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/23 "2021-07-28T14:50:21Z")
Yes, I know parents get colds from their kids. What I don’t know is if they get every cold their kids get. ---
**Author:** ![Trom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@Trom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trom)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/24 "2021-07-28T14:51:33Z")
This is a pretty neat tool looking at school openings/closings around the world. [https://infographic.education.org/insights/en/](https://infographic.education.org/insights/en/) Is there going to be a surge? “We don’t know,” is the honest answer. Some countries have shown one at the time of reopening school, some haven’t. It might be easy to pull up a graph, hold up your thumb and squint and perfectly identify where school openings/closings caused a surge/decrease in cases. It’s trivially easy to do that with pretty much every mitigation effort that’s been tried no matter what you want to see. I don’t think we will be able to conclusively say what mitigation efforts had what effects until years from now when the next batch of statistics PhDs finish analyzing this stuff. As Insights for Education says above: > Our work does not attempt to establish correlation or causality between school status and COVID-19 infection levels. The three examples below have been chosen to illustrate the complexity in making simplistic assumptions about the impact of school closure and opening on virus progression. > > What we have observed is many different patterns, most probably reflecting multiple factors including state of economic activity, testing, tracing, and health system capacity. Schools are just one aspect of the policy response to managing COVID-19. School closures have implications for wider society and vice versa. ---
**Author:** ![Jay\_Z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Jay\_Z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jay_Z)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/25 "2021-07-28T14:54:59Z")
I was NOT one of the people who didn’t have a cold/flu for a year because of Covid lockdown. Even though the schools were virtual here for over a year. Reason being, I’m divorced, and the kids go back and forth. The ex and her partner wound up getting Covid (mild cases) because he worked in a hospital. The kids stayed with me during that period and didn’t get it. But they got other things and passed those on to me. ---
**Author:** ![Falchion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a88e57/32.png) [@Falchion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Falchion)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/26 "2021-07-28T15:02:45Z")
> [@Chatterbox1](#): > > Yes, I know parents get colds from their kids. What I don’t know is if they get every cold their kids get. Anecdotally, I get more colds/illness now than I did before I had small children, but nowhere near as often as they do. But my takeaway from that is the opposite of yours. I definitely get exposed to every cold the kids have (they slobber and booger all over me). But I develop symptomatic illness less frequently. I always assumed that a lifetime of exposure had made _me_ less susceptible (also heavy drinking to self-disinfect). ---
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/27 "2021-07-28T15:05:32Z")
Could be. Or it could be that some of the colds they get weren’t very infectious and the children only got it because they stuck the wrong crayon in their mouth. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/28 "2021-07-28T17:06:23Z")
In my experience, yep. If my kid got a cold, I had a cold - usually more severe and longer lasting than the kids. You don’t sound like you’ve ever parented young children. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/29 "2021-07-28T17:16:50Z")
Another thing I think we’d see is that the stark difference in infections of children wouldn’t be universal. Not every culture separates their children from the family and sticks them in poorly ventilated rooms all day. But kids showed a similar resistance to infection from COVID across the board. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/30 "2021-07-28T17:18:24Z")
I think the ones that can, have, but many really can’t without ripping out the HVAC and starting from scratch. My windows don’t open. They were never intended to open. Most people I know don’t even have windows in their classrooms. And the HVAC struggles normally. It couldn’t move more air. ---
**Author:** ![raspberry\_hunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@raspberry\_hunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raspberry_hunter)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/31 "2021-07-28T19:17:43Z")
I get a cold every time my kids get one, which is very often. Both my kids and I have had so many by now, mind you, that I think my immune system is supercharged and often it just deals with it without super visible symptoms (e.g., no runny nose) and I just feel sort of vaguely crummy, but in a way that coincides almost exactly (usually a day offset) with my kids complaining about feeling crummy and sometimes having more overt symptoms. So yeah, I would also have expected parents to have markedly fewer cases/serious cases if “exposure to previous coronaviruses” were a thing (I even asked that on the Dope months ago) but that doesn’t seem to be the case. (I still suspect that parents probably have at least some boost due to our immune systems being supercharged, mind you…) ---
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/32 "2021-07-28T19:29:39Z")
You know, I didn’t invent the theory I mentioned. Pediatricians did. But hey, you’re the expert. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/33 "2021-07-28T19:33:29Z")
Is that really necessary? I’m just stating my personal experience. But it doesn’t sound like you’ve parented small kids - have you? ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/34 "2021-07-28T20:31:18Z")
Yeah, I went from about fourth grade through about 35 when I had my first child getting a cold/sinus issue _maybe_ annually, and catching honest-to-God influenza maybe twice; once in college, once in graduate school. Then when I had kids _and they went to preschool_, it seemed like I had a cold every 6-8 weeks- I’d get over one, and I’d have another within 3-4 weeks like clockwork. It eventually slowed down, but there was a definite bump of colds and generic illness when my older child went to kindergarten for that first semester. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/35 "2021-07-28T20:33:45Z")
Beyond that, as I’m sure you know well, most school districts don’t have the money to just unilaterally improve HVAC at the drop of a hat; that kind of thing would have to either be state-funded, or funded by a bond issue, neither of which are the sort of thing they could do in anything approaching a hurry. ---
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/36 "2021-07-28T20:38:12Z")
Sorry, before edit your post came off a tad aggressive. You had “clearly never been a parent” in there when I responded. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/37 "2021-07-28T21:33:40Z")
If I did, the post would have been marked as edited. It isn’t, it never said that. ---
**Author:** ![Chatterbox1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/57b2e6/32.png) [@Chatterbox1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chatterbox1)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/38 "2021-07-28T21:49:08Z")
Fyi, if you edit within a couple minutes there is no marking that it was edited. But I guess I misread. Apologies. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2021, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/40 "2021-07-28T22:39:51Z")
Done a fair bit of editing of SDMB posts in the past, have we? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2021, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339/41 "2021-07-29T02:49:52Z")
> [@Chatterbox1](#): > > Yes, I know parents get colds from their kids. What I don’t know is if they get every cold their kids get. I’ve asked about this before because the parents of kids under 10 I know are sick way more often than non-parents, so I couldn’t figure out why people insist little kids get sick so often because they lack previous exposure but that in no way explains why they usually make their parents with “mature” immune systems sick too. Anyway, there hasn’t really been a lot of formal research on the topic, but what little there is says duh, of course parents get sick more often. The article below is about one of the studies [You’re Not Making It Up: Parents Get Sick Way More Often](https://www.fatherly.com/health-science/why-do-i-keep-getting-sick-blame-the-kids/) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/surge-among-kids-when-they-go-back-to-school/947339.md?page=3)