Does DCPS care? New model shows even with masks, 40% of students will still be infected with Delta

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, my kids need to be in school, and I want them in school.

But the people here trying to slam concerned parents as “anxious” and “irrational” are being unfair (to put it nicely).

It is perfectly rational to be concerned about a highly contagious, evolving disease with uncertain outcomes and limited, often-conflicting research — especially when some other parents have the attitude that “kids will get it; so what?”, which is hardly a helpful attitude towards public health.

Schools should open with lots of well-founded precautions, and people should be good, unselfish citizens and follow the rules.

Pretty sure every parent that posts here is anxious. Our degrees of anxiety about different things are just different. I think some people are MORE worried about schools not opening, and they are worried that somehow very very alarmed parents will cause that to happen (I personally don't, but I think that's their investment in these arguments). Their anxiety is legitimate as well, and their reactions shouldn't be judged any more harshly than the anxiety of the people who are terrified of delta.

I think the attitude that "kids will get it" is either because we've been so alarmed for so long that we can't keep up the alarm, or we've taken the alarming information about delta spread and use it differently from others. (E.g., "if everyone unvaccinated is going to get delta, there is no reason to NOT have school" versus "every unvaccinated person is going to get delta, so we shouldn't have school". OR we look at the stats and do indeed see that the hospitalization rate for kids with covid hovers around <1.0%. And the death rate is 0.01%.

TLDR: don't judge others.

I’m the poster who made the comment about doctors not necessarily always making rational decisions for their kids, and I agree. Everyone has been traumatized by the last year. Some by the virus, some by virtual school, some by the way the media have covered the virus. It is hard for anybody to stay cool headed after this experience.

We should all just be mad at the people who don't get vaxxed but have access to the vaccine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey don’t get medical advice from the internet. Have you ever read the Health and Medicine threads? It will take you approximately 30 seconds to find a comment that you will immediately realize is just made by someone who is talking out of their azz. Talk to your trusted pediatrician.

Haven’t had a chance to talk to my pediatrician. But I am friends with two doctors. Neither are sending their under 12s to in-person school in the fall. That’s making me real nervous.

Where are your friends, what are the vaccination rates among different populations there, and are the schools doing mandatory masks?

Are you talking about DC?

One in DC and one in Chicago. Mandatory masks, yes. Ugh.

I have many many doctor friends after spending college, law school and post law school years in Boston. All, including several pediatricians, are sending their kids, with ages ranging from 6 months to 15 years, to camps this summer and to daycare/ school in the fall. None are in the south or in areas where masks or not required but all feel comfortable sending kids in a masked environment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The things that experts are recommending for the < 12s in relation to delta are:

1) vaccination of anyone around kids (focused largely on parents and other family, but easily this includes the school workforce, daycares, etc)
2) masks in schools
3) hand washing
4) ventilation in schools

No one is suggesting that schools close, because there are higher risks to schools closing to kids.

To me what I'd push for in terms of policy that is actually under the government's control, is school workforce vaccination, as that probably goes the furthest in protecting kids. At least in DC we have mandated masking already, so that's not the political fight.

They’re also recommending asymptomatic testing, which in modeling showed a 20% drop in transmission. So of those five things, DCPS is doing one? Two? Will the bathrooms have soap this year? Does hand washing even matter at this point?

Are you referring to the original model from this OP post? That suggests an additional 5% drop from testing (in the context of masks). Are you looking at something else?

I too am puzzled by a recommendation about hand washing (that was from the Kline video earlier). I thought that we were pretty sure this is isn’t spread via surfaces. (Not that hand washing is a bad thing, and certainly there should be soap in bathrooms — WTF?!).

There should be soap, disinfecting etc. Kids spread a lot of things when these are not available, and any cough, sniffle or fever will add to Covid anxiety (is it? isn't it?) and should be minimized. Second, flu vaccine and flu prevention--flu can lead to deadly outcomes + pneumonia in children. Any cleanliness and disease mitigation is not just for Covid and should be in place in all schools forever-more. It already should have been

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The things that experts are recommending for the < 12s in relation to delta are:

1) vaccination of anyone around kids (focused largely on parents and other family, but easily this includes the school workforce, daycares, etc)
2) masks in schools
3) hand washing
4) ventilation in schools

No one is suggesting that schools close, because there are higher risks to schools closing to kids.

To me what I'd push for in terms of policy that is actually under the government's control, is school workforce vaccination, as that probably goes the furthest in protecting kids. At least in DC we have mandated masking already, so that's not the political fight.

They’re also recommending asymptomatic testing, which in modeling showed a 20% drop in transmission. So of those five things, DCPS is doing one? Two? Will the bathrooms have soap this year? Does hand washing even matter at this point?

Are you referring to the original model from this OP post? That suggests an additional 5% drop from testing (in the context of masks). Are you looking at something else?

I too am puzzled by a recommendation about hand washing (that was from the Kline video earlier). I thought that we were pretty sure this is isn’t spread via surfaces. (Not that hand washing is a bad thing, and certainly there should be soap in bathrooms — WTF?!).

There should be soap, disinfecting etc. Kids spread a lot of things when these are not available, and any cough, sniffle or fever will add to Covid anxiety (is it? isn't it?) and should be minimized. Second, flu vaccine and flu prevention--flu can lead to deadly outcomes + pneumonia in children. Any cleanliness and disease mitigation is not just for Covid and should be in place in all schools forever-more. It already should have been

Agree! Especially for the dreaded norovirus. Hoping for less of that in the future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The things that experts are recommending for the < 12s in relation to delta are:

1) vaccination of anyone around kids (focused largely on parents and other family, but easily this includes the school workforce, daycares, etc)
2) masks in schools
3) hand washing
4) ventilation in schools

No one is suggesting that schools close, because there are higher risks to schools closing to kids.

To me what I'd push for in terms of policy that is actually under the government's control, is school workforce vaccination, as that probably goes the furthest in protecting kids. At least in DC we have mandated masking already, so that's not the political fight.

They’re also recommending asymptomatic testing, which in modeling showed a 20% drop in transmission. So of those five things, DCPS is doing one? Two? Will the bathrooms have soap this year? Does hand washing even matter at this point?

Are you referring to the original model from this OP post? That suggests an additional 5% drop from testing (in the context of masks). Are you looking at something else?

I too am puzzled by a recommendation about hand washing (that was from the Kline video earlier). I thought that we were pretty sure this is isn’t spread via surfaces. (Not that hand washing is a bad thing, and certainly there should be soap in bathrooms — WTF?!).

There should be soap, disinfecting etc. Kids spread a lot of things when these are not available, and any cough, sniffle or fever will add to Covid anxiety (is it? isn't it?) and should be minimized. Second, flu vaccine and flu prevention--flu can lead to deadly outcomes + pneumonia in children. Any cleanliness and disease mitigation is not just for Covid and should be in place in all schools forever-more. It already should have been

Agree! Especially for the dreaded norovirus. Hoping for less of that in the future.

I forgot about norovirus! Agree. The idea of not having soap in bathrooms and classroom sinks is just repellant and worthy of a news expose. I am fine with kids now and then getting sick and building up immunity, but when I see whole classes out with one thing (flu, noro etc) that's a breakdown in some system - be it cleaning, tracking and reporting and intervening and sending kids home, or all of the above -needlessly disruptive to learning and to the families at home.

I also mock cleaning theater with Covid, we should know clearly what works what doesn't for Covid, but any overall contagious disease mitigation including soap and enhanced cleanings is helpful in group environments, period. If not for Covid, for the million other things.

[Anonymous]

COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

If this is supposed to be an indication of delta, then pertinently the hospitalization rate in that same period hasn't changed. Still overall about ~1% of cases.

https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/children-and-covid-19-state-level-data-report/

So neither of these things is delta or both are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

If this is supposed to be an indication of delta, then pertinently the hospitalization rate in that same period hasn't changed. Still overall about ~1% of cases.

https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/children-and-covid-19-state-level-data-report/

So neither of these things is delta or both are.

Let me amend my statement: How long would be expect a lag from case identification to hospital, for kids? A week?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

If this is supposed to be an indication of delta, then pertinently the hospitalization rate in that same period hasn't changed. Still overall about ~1% of cases.

https://services.aap.org/en/pages/2019-novel-coronavirus-covid-19-infections/children-and-covid-19-state-level-data-report/

So neither of these things is delta or both are.

Let me amend my statement: How long would be expect a lag from case identification to hospital, for kids? A week?

But I've read that 85% of US cases are delta now, so it would seem we are well into delta, like more than a couple of weeks. For ex., DC cases have been going up for about 3 weeks now (if we are thinking that rise is attributable to delta -- I don't know).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

There might be validity to that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

There might be validity to that.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

If you think we’ll be better off in a congregate setting you are truly delusional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

If you think we’ll be better off in a congregate setting you are truly delusional.

do u think most kids stay at home alone when they are not at school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:COVID cases in children up 85% in the last week.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/covid-rise-children-study-statistics-b1897711.html

See? They need to be in school! Clearly summer vacation is contributing to the spike.

If you think we’ll be better off in a congregate setting you are truly delusional.

do u think most kids stay at home alone when they are not at school

They certainly are not sitting unmasked indoors with 30 other kids which is exactly what they will be doing at school.

But they ARE getting it from (probably) family right now. That's always been true that transmission at home is more prevalent than transmission in schools. It would seem like keeping kids at home might even lead to MORE spread.

Really, the focus should be on getting parents vaccinated, if we are very concerned about kids' covid cases.

I feel like that was explored earlier in the pandemic -- whether community transmission would be lower if kids were in school versus kept out of school. That's because people can't just keep their kids at home by themselves; the kids are in congregant childcare settings, or are out at each others' houses, or at their own jobs. So the number of contacts of each kid is potentially higher than it would have been had they been in school, overall.