I’m getting nervous about school because of delta

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not giving us a 30 percent chance of having in-person school this year. School board will use loopholes in the VA law to go back to virtual, which won't even happen until maybe Oct. because they'll have to set it all up again and that'll take another month or so.

I hope I'm wrong, but I'm getting a very bad feeling about this and have no faith at all anymore in FCPS administration.

Seems like in-person is easier. Wouldn’t incompetent gravitate towards the easy path?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I felt much more relaxed about returning to school towards the end of last year because i had been vaccinated and even though most of the kids had ill-fitting masks, I felt relatively safe.
Now, though, with this variant, it's a little bit alarming to think we are going back with no social distancing measures and unvaccinated kids who can't seem to wear their masks properly. I just finished teaching in the summer SOAR program and I've had kids sneeze on me, touch me, hug me, and pretty much get be less than a foot from me while their mask is below their nose.
That small fear in the back of my mind is starting to creep back in as the start of school approaches. I don't want a delay to school. I worked summer school to help the kids that I know i'll have this fall to catch up a bit. I don't want virtual as we just can't.
I do wish we had a better way of enforcing the masks or money to provide better masks for all students.

Yeah, I am getting a third booster. This thread scared me sufficiently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not giving us a 30 percent chance of having in-person school this year. School board will use loopholes in the VA law to go back to virtual, which won't even happen until maybe Oct. because they'll have to set it all up again and that'll take another month or so.

I hope I'm wrong, but I'm getting a very bad feeling about this and have no faith at all anymore in FCPS administration.

Seems like in-person is easier. Wouldn’t incompetent gravitate towards the easy path?

Yeah, that’s what I am thinking. They aren’t going to worry about it and just let people get sick. Of course, they will still meet virtually to keep themselves safe.

[Anonymous]

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/01/world/covid-delta-variant-vaccine

NYT reports on pediatric coronavirus cases

[Anonymous]

FCPS should offer asynchronous virtual option (with video proctoring for big tests/final exams and virtual office hours in case students have questions),

[Anonymous]

Something all the people freaking out on this thread are missing. It’s will COVID kill me/my kids vs will I have come cold-like symptoms. Let’s go to the data. FL COVID wards are full. They’ve got problems. But that’s not us.

Now, let’s do Fairfax County. Last week we were a moderate transmission and… 0.0% of the hospital beds in this region were we occupied by COVID patients.

That’s right. No COVID hospitalizations last week. The vaccines are working. People who are getting infected aren’t needing to be hospitalized and aren’t dying here because we have high vaccine uptake.

https://www.fcps.edu/return-school/fcps-confirmed-covid-19-case-reporting

So calm down. The vaccines are working and our public health situation is good. I have been very cautious with COVID. But I can also do a risk-benefit analysis. And the risk in Fairfax co. Is very low.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Something all the people freaking out on this thread are missing. It’s will COVID kill me/my kids vs will I have come cold-like symptoms. Let’s go to the data. FL COVID wards are full. They’ve got problems. But that’s not us.

Now, let’s do Fairfax County. Last week we were a moderate transmission and… 0.0% of the hospital beds in this region were we occupied by COVID patients.

That’s right. No COVID hospitalizations last week. The vaccines are working. People who are getting infected aren’t needing to be hospitalized and aren’t dying here because we have high vaccine uptake.

https://www.fcps.edu/return-school/fcps-confirmed-covid-19-case-reporting

So calm down. The vaccines are working and our public health situation is good. I have been very cautious with COVID. But I can also do a risk-benefit analysis. And the risk in Fairfax co. Is very low.

The risk in Fairfax could change. Quickly. We only have about 55% of our population that is fully vaccinated.

[Anonymous]

Francis Collins, head of NIH, today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlseO1ZKDp4
"We are now once again seeing case levels per day closing in on a hundred thousand which we haven't seen since February. So this is really a different virus than last year and everything we learned about covid a year ago you got to sort of hit the reset button on now how we react to it. We also are learning and this is not particularly good news that vaccinated people if they get infected, which is rare but it does happen, they have pretty high viral loads which means they could be passing it on to other people even though they have a very low risk of being seriously ill themselves, but they can still be a vector."

Anthony Fauci today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jeyb4qoMrv4
"Things are going to get worse."
"We're looking, not I believe to lockdown, but to pain and suffering in the future because we're seeing the cases go up."
[...]
"When you have unvaccinated people getting infected, you're propagating the dynamics of the outbreak which ultimately impacts everybody the from the standpoint of having to wear masks, from the standpoint of the safety of the kids in school, from the standpoint of being able to open up everything the way we were when we were normal. So yes, from the standpoint of illness, hospitalization suffering and death, the unvaccinated are much more vulnerable[...].

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, maybe more research would help you. You don't sound like you understand the delta variant or the vaccines. Your fears aren't rational.

Then so many of us aren't rational then, even though we do, absolutely, understand the data. Keep up, bud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Something all the people freaking out on this thread are missing. It’s will COVID kill me/my kids vs will I have come cold-like symptoms. Let’s go to the data. FL COVID wards are full. They’ve got problems. But that’s not us.

Now, let’s do Fairfax County. Last week we were a moderate transmission and… 0.0% of the hospital beds in this region were we occupied by COVID patients.

That’s right. No COVID hospitalizations last week. The vaccines are working. People who are getting infected aren’t needing to be hospitalized and aren’t dying here because we have high vaccine uptake.

https://www.fcps.edu/return-school/fcps-confirmed-covid-19-case-reporting

So calm down. The vaccines are working and our public health situation is good. I have been very cautious with COVID. But I can also do a risk-benefit analysis. And the risk in Fairfax co. Is very low.

The risk in Fairfax could change. Quickly. We only have about 55% of our population that is fully vaccinated.

Plus, tons of people travel in August.

[Anonymous]

From another thread

Delta's R0 is 8-10, which means each infected person will go on to infect around 9 more. That really adds up if each of them goes on to infect another 9, compared to the 2.5-3 of the original delta.

Someone illustrated the "1000x more viral replication" bit as "being in the same room as 1 person contagious with delta would be the same as being in the room with 1000 people contagious with the original covid."
I've been wanted to share that, but feared the screamy accusation of fear-mongering/speculation/misinformation, etc. It's just how an expert presented it in passing while discussing other aspects of the pandemic.

6ft indoors has always been ridiculous, even with the first covid. It's airborne, it travels in aerosols, so it concentrates wherever the heck airflow takes it in a room (or further with delta). Reducing the number of people in a room (i.e. a class cohort) is important just to reduce the odds of someone being infectious and the number of other people who could get infected in that room, and distance is a good proxy for smaller groups. Some people will read that and think "distance is pointless? Let's fill up the class like it's 2019, then."

We were told by Gottlieb to upgrade our masks to N95s, and that cloth and surgical won't cut it anymore.

(LOL, if all they say to you is "Relax" you'd be lucky - what i read is far harsher than that).

[Anonymous]

Covid is here to stay, and sooner or later everyone will get it like you do with the cold or flu. Thankfully the vaccine will keep the severity away. No one is shutting down schools over it anymore. We're moving forward and proceeding with life. And with any illness, it's in your best interest to take care of your health so your body is equipped with an optimal immune system.

[Anonymous]

This Norwegian study shows 50% of young people with long Covid and of that, a significant portion had neurological problems with memory and concentration. I don’t want that for my kids.

https://sciencenorway.no/a/1880560

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This Norwegian study shows 50% of young people with long Covid and of that, a significant portion had neurological problems with memory and concentration. I don’t want that for my kids.

https://sciencenorway.no/a/1880560

The study cites people ages 16-30. Just want to clarify.

[Anonymous]

No way are the teachers going to allow schools to open for in person.